


I'll Sing a Song Beside You

by chelseababylove



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Identity Reveal, partial reveal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-09
Updated: 2018-04-26
Packaged: 2018-11-30 00:42:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 31,402
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11452422
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/chelseababylove/pseuds/chelseababylove
Summary: When Marinette accidentally transforms in front of Chat Noir, the two must learn how to navigate through their ever-growing friendship.





	1. one.

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Count on Me by Bruno Mars.

It’s nearly midnight when Marinette hears the tapping on her window. It takes her a second to finish her problem set—and maybe she dawdles for a bit, delaying the inevitable—before she glances up. She catches his eye and points up toward her balcony but he tilts his head in confusion.  
  
“Honestly,” Marinette mumbles to herself as she makes her way over to where he’s hanging. She pulls the latch and wrenches the window open. The cool breeze of the night feels nice as it brushes her face. “Meet me on my balcony.”  
  
She doesn’t give him time to respond before slamming the window shut and rushes up to meet him. Pausing on her bed, Marinette turns to her kwami and asks, “Do you want to come with me, Tikki?”  
  
“Sure! Are you ready for this?”  
  
“As ready as I’ll ever be.” Tikki flies into Marinette’s jacket, allowing the two heroes to talk before introductions are made.  
  
Marinette made two thoughtless mistakes earlier and is stuck facing the consequences now. The first mistake was being in the wrong place at the wrong time (or perhaps that was Chat?) and accidently letting the proverbial cat out of the bag. The second was fleeing the second she had purified the akuma and restored order to Paris. She’s grateful Chat waited a few hours before hunting her down but pushing it off for too long would just result in even more trouble. Really, they should have talked earlier.  
  
It’s too late to change anything now though, so Marinette squares her shoulders and prepares to face him.  
  
“Hi,” Chat greets her as soon as she hops onto the balcony. He’s leaning awkwardly against the railing, trying to appear cool but failing even more so than usual. His tail is thrashing frantically about and Marinette keeps focusing on it, instead of his face.  
  
“Hi,” Marinette says, cautious.  
  
“So… how are you?”  
  
“Is that really what you’re going with?”  
  
“I’ll be honest, I don’t really know what the proper etiquette is in this situation.” He shifts, placing more weight on the railing so he can cross his legs.  
  
“Me neither,” Marinette admits.  
  
“Do you—” he clears his throat and tries again. “Do you want to know who I am too? To make it equal?”  
  
“No!” Marinette throws out her hands, making her seem even more dramatic than intended. Chat’s cat ears droop and she has to look away. “No, it’s bad enough you know my identity. There’s no point in making this whole thing even worse.”  
  
“Even worse… right.”  
  
“It’s not… I mean.” Marinette pulls on her pigtails and groans. She doesn’t know what she’s supposed to say, how she’s supposed to act. She’s thought about telling Chat her true identity plenty of times; it was usually a couple years down the road after Hawkmoth was defeated and there was no need to keep it a secret from him. Most of her scenarios usually included sunsets and music and a lot of other unnecessary romance that she will never, ever admit to.  
  
“I think what Marinette is trying to say,” Tikki intervenes, flying out of Marinette’s jacket to get between the two. “Is that it’s dangerous that you know her identity and she doesn’t want to add to that.”  
  
“Yes,” Marinette says, nodding eagerly. “What Tikki said.”  
  
Chat looks between Tikki and Marinette a couple of times. “I’m guessing you’re Ladybug’s kwami?”  
  
“Oh! Right, I’m sorry I forgot. Chat Noir, this is Tikki! Tikki, this is Chat Noir!”  
  
“It’s a pleasure to finally meet you,” Tikki says.  
  
“The pleasure is all mine.” Chat sweeps into a deep bow and it’s the first time he seems like Chat since he landed on the balcony. When he straightens he looks back at Marinette and adds, “I’m sorry I caught you transforming.”  
  
“It was my fault,” Marinette grumbles. She isn’t sure when she’s going to forgive herself for being so reckless; thank goodness it was only Chat who caught her. “I should have checked to make sure there was no one else there.”  
  
“To be fair, why would anyone be in a utility closet?”  
  
“There could have been a janitor! Or people making out!”  
  
“Or a superhero who just transformed in there?”  
  
Marinette sighs. “Or a superhero who just transformed. If I had waited just one more second, none of this would have happened.”  
  
“I know it’s dangerous and you didn’t want me to know but… I’m glad I know. I’m glad it’s you.”  
  
Warmth fills Marinette at Chat’s words and she can feel herself blushing. “You barely know me.”  
  
“You’re amazing, Marinette.” There’s something about the way he says it that tickles at her memory. It sounds familiar but she doesn’t think he’s ever said that exact phrase to her before so she brushes it off. “I don’t need to know anything else. Although, I’d like to.”  
  
“Like to what?”  
  
“I’d like to get to know you better,” he says simply.  
  
“You do?”  
  
“It’s hard to talk about ourselves in case we reveal something that would be too incriminating but since I already know you’re Marinette, it couldn’t hurt to know the girl behind the mask, would it?”  
  
“I’m not very interesting without my spots, Chat.” She doesn’t believe it, not really. Being Ladybug as long as she has, Marinette’s confidence has soared. The problem is, she feels like her team idolizes her in a way that isn’t healthy or fair. And she absolutely doesn’t want to see Chat’s face when he realizes the amazing Ladybug isn’t nearly as fantastical as he once imagined.  
  
“Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Chat says. Marinette blinks at him, not realizing he knew her well enough to remember her last name. “In addition to being the super amazing, badass, incredible Ladybug, you’re a talented enough designer to have won a Gabriel Agreste contest and you designed a cover album for Jagged Stone. Jagged Stone! Do you know how impressive that is?”  
  
“…Did you stalk me on the internet before coming here?”  
  
“What? No! I—I, well, maybe?”  
  
Marinette can’t help herself, she doubles over laughing. Leave it to her ridiculous partner to do his research on her.  
  
“Stop laughing at me,” Chat says but there’s a grin spreading on his face.  
  
“You know,” Marinette says when she’s calmed down and can actually breathe again, “I’m pretty terrified for what might happen but for what it’s worth, I’m glad you know too.”  
  
His answering smile almost makes it all worth it.  
  
“But… we can keep this between ourselves, right,” Marinette asks. It’s embarrassing enough that Chat found out her identity—Ladybug, the one most adamant to keep their identities a secret—but she doesn’t think she could handle the shame if Queen Bee and Rena Rouge find out he knows.  
  
“Well, I was planning on plastering your identity all over Paris but if you insist,” Chat jokes. Marinette rolls her eyes at her partner.  
  
“I meant I don’t want our team knowing you know who I am.”  
  
“Why not? I want to rub it in their faces. They want to know who you are as badly as I did.”  
  
“Please, Chat. I don’t want them to know.”  
  
His smile drops as he inspects her face. Marinette fidgets under his stern gaze; she never knew he could look so serious.  
  
“Whatever you want, My Lady.”  
  
“Thanks, Kitty. You’re the best.”  
  
“It’s about time you caught on.”  
  
Marinette flicks Chat’s bell. “Don’t worry. I always knew how amazing you were.” She’s gratified by the hint of a blush that starts to creep below his mask.  
  
“Not as amazing as you.”  
  
“Obviously. I _am_ Ladybug after all.”  
  
“You’re Ladybug,” Chat repeats, his smile growing wider. He laughs and pulls Marinette in for a hug. Marinette freezes for a second before melting into him, letting his warmth wrap around her like a blanket. “Marinette,” he whispers. “You’re Ladybug.”  
  
“I thought we already established this.”  
  
“We did. It’s still sinking in.”  
  
Marinette giggles and pulls away, bopping him on the nose as she retreats from his arms. “Maybe a good night’s sleep will help. I need to get to bed.”  
  
“Right. Because it’s late and there’s school tomorrow.”  
  
“That is why, yes,” Marinette says, amused.  
  
Chat blinks a couple times, as though coming out of a daze. “Yeah, I should go. Sorry for stopping by so late.”  
  
“It’s fine. Now, get some sleep, okay? We could both use it.”  
  
“Will do. Until we meet again, My Lady.” Chat grabs her hand and dips into a bow but Marinette pulls her hand away before he can kiss it.  
  
Marinette watches as he leaps away, showing off as always. “That went better than I expected.”  
  
“Chat Noir loves you, Marinette,” Tikki says, nuzzling Marinette’s face. “There was never anything to worry about.”  
  
“I know. You would think I would learn to listen to you by now.”  
  
“I don’t think that’s ever going to happen,” Tikki giggles. “Can we go to sleep now? I’m tired.”  
  
Marinette nods in affirmation and heads back to her room, feeling much lighter than she ever thought possible.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to wait until after the blackout to post but I've had an incredibly stressful few weeks and this coming one is going to be even worse so I'm posting to cheer myself up. I have about 85% of the whole story already written so I'll be updating fairly frequently. There is barely any plot to this story, btw.
> 
> I need more ML friends. Come find me on tumblr at chelseaapproved!


	2. two.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien tries to talk to Marinette.

Adrien isn’t sure what to do with himself at school. Marinette is sitting behind him, most likely taking notes on the lesson he can’t focus on. Marinette is sitting behind him, with the perfect view of the back of his head. Marinette is sitting behind him, completely oblivious to the fact that he’s Chat Noir. He wants, quite desperately, to turn around and talk to her. The problem, as he found out earlier that morning, is that Adrien and Marinette aren’t all that close. He doesn’t know how to initiate a conversation with her.

When Madame Bustier lets them work on a worksheet in small groups, Adrien jumps on the opportunity.

“Hey Marinette, Alya, do you want to work with Nino and me?”

Nino looks at him, surprised, but Adrien ignores him. Instead, he gives all his attention to Marinette, who isn’t even looking at him.

“Sure!” Alya elbows Marinette. “You’d like to work with Adrien and Nino, right Marinette?”

“Uh, y-yeah. Yes. Of course,” Marinette stutters, nodding her head vigorously. She finally looks his way, locking her blue eyes on him. He throws his most charming smile at her but she looks away before he thinks it can really work its magic.

“Great! Hey, maybe Nino and I can work on the first half, and you two can do the second and in 15 minutes we’ll swap answers,” Alya suggests.

“That’s a great idea,” Adrien says. Bless Alya and her ingenious plans.

Nino grins. “Can’t get enough of me, huh?”

Alya narrows her eyes. “Keep that up and maybe I’ll change my mind.”

“Aw don’t be like that.”

They keep up their bantering but Adrien moves on to Marinette, who is by far the most interesting thing in the room.

“So, um. H-how do you want to do this,” Marinette asks. The heat of her stare is too much for Adrien to handle so he looks down at the worksheet. He did the required reading last night but that was after finding out Marinette was the love of his life, so the details are a bit hazy.

“Uh, I don’t actually remember much of the reading last night,” he admits, rubbing the back of his neck.

“I don’t really either,” she says. Of course she doesn’t, she was probably freaking out about Chat Noir finding out her identity.

  
“Aren’t we a pair?”

  
Marinette smiles at him and it hits him, for the thousandth time that day, that he’s talking to Ladybug. Ladybug just gave him the sweetest smile in the world and he’s on cloud nine.

  
“Maybe—maybe between the two of us we can come up with something acceptable?” Marinette offers.

  
“Sounds like a plan. I don’t know what it is but I have a feeling we can do anything as long as we do it together.” He means it as a tongue-in-cheek response, an inside joke with himself but she turns bright red and starts stammering about their work. He doesn’t know what he did but the rest of their time is spent in awkward silences and clipped responses.

  
“Do you think Marinette was acting weird in class,” he asks Nino during lunch. Adrien somehow convinced his father to let him eat lunch at school two days of the week, so the pair are sitting on a bench eating sandwiches. He can see Marinette talking avidly to Nathanael and Rose a little ways away.

  
“Weird how?”

  
“I dunno. Just… odd. Really quiet.”

  
“That’s just Marinette, dude. You know how she is.”

  
“Yeah…”

  
“What’s wrong?”

  
“She… I don’t get her,” Adrien finally admits, poking grumpily at his sandwich. “Sometimes she can be this loud, unapologetic girl who stands up for everyone and fights to get what she wants. And then other times she can’t look at me longer than 5 seconds without stuttering.”

  
“I don’t know what to tell you, my man. Marinette is a girl of many mysteries.”

  
“Tell me about it,” Adrien mutters.

  
“Why the sudden interest?” Nino wiggles his eyebrows suggestively. Adrien doesn’t know how to respond. It’s not the first time Nino’s implied Adrien might have feelings for Marinette but it is the first time it’s _true_.

  
“It recently came to my attention that we could probably be really good friends if she’d let me.”

  
“Keep talking to her and give her some time. She’ll come around eventually.”

  
“How long am I supposed to wait? I’ve known her for over two years now.”

  
“Patience, dude. I promise, if you try hard enough, you guys will become great friends.”

  
But Adrien isn’t sold on Nino’s shrug off. There’s got to be a reason Marinette acted so closed off in class today. It torments him so much that Adrien can’t help himself. He needs to see her again, reassure himself that they’re good and the reveal didn’t mess up their dynamic.

  
Which is how he finds himself on Marinette’s balcony the second night in a row, pacing as he decides whether he actually wants to disturb her or not.

  
“Is this going to be a thing now?”

  
Chat jumps and turns around, not realizing Marinette heard him up there. He immediately feels his face heat up and he dips into a bow to cover his blush. She’s wearing pajamas, tiny, short pajamas that are definitely not covering enough of her.

  
“Good evening, M’lady,” he says to his boots, unwilling to look at her again. He has to straighten eventually though, so he heads to the railing and faces out to the city.

  
“It’s not exactly evening anymore, Chat. It’s nearly midnight.”

  
“Ah, sorry about that. I have a hectic schedule.”

  
“You didn’t have to visit me if it was too much trouble.”

  
“I wanted to see you.” It’s the truth and he doesn’t regret saying it but wow, he didn’t realize how pathetic it would sound.

  
“Oh. Well, um, thanks.”

  
“I can leave if you want me to though. I didn’t think about the time when I left.”

  
“Don’t be silly. I just wasn’t expecting you.”

  
Chat feels guilty, despite Marinette’s insistence that she wants him there. He doesn’t know what he was thinking, really, barging onto her balcony without invitation so late.

  
“Would you like a snack or drink or something?”

  
“I’ve already burdened you enough.”

  
“You’re not a burden.” Marinette nudges him. “It’s honestly kind of nice that we can hang out just because. No crazy akumas or Hawkmoth to worry about.”

  
“Yeah,” he breathes and finally allows himself to look at her again. Her tiny shorts are pink with white polka dots and she’s wearing a matching tank top that’s riding up, exposing a sliver of her stomach. It is simultaneously adorable and sexy and so, so Marinette, he doesn’t know what to do with himself. She’s too cute to handle.

  
“Chat?”

  
It’s only when he forces his eyes back to her face that Chat realizes he was very openly ogling his nearly naked partner.

  
“Uh, sorry,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck.

  
She tilts her head, a small smirk forming on her lips, making her look even more enticing. “You okay there, Kitty?”

  
He shrugs, trying to play it cool. It shouldn’t matter that this is his classmate; she is his partner and has seen him do some of the stupidest shit.

  
“Just enjoying the view.” Chat gestures to the city before them but they both know what he’s talking about.

  
“You’re so ridiculous,” she giggles. “Anyway, cookies? I’m sure Tikki won’t mind sharing.”

  
He smiles weakly at her. “I can hardly say no to that, can I?”

  
Marinette hurries back into her room, leaving Chat by himself on her balcony. He drums his fingers against the rail. Now that he’s alone again he can’t help but get anxious. Today was so awkward and he doesn’t know how to fix that. It seems like she’s fine around him as Chat Noir but what happens if she finds out who he really is? Could his identity ruin their dynamic?

  
It’s not a pleasant thought, and certainly not something he’s ever worried about before. He always figured finding out that the suave, debonair Chat Noir was also sexy supermodel Adrien Agreste would work in his favor. After all, how many people could claim they were a model and a superhero? But Marinette knows him personally and is always a bit… weird with him. He chalked it up to her being shy but now that he knows she’s Ladybug, he doesn’t know what to make of her.

  
“I realized I don’t actually know what you prefer,” Marinette said, jolting Chat out of his thoughts. “So I brought a bunch of different things. I hope that’s okay.”

  
Chat turns to see Marinette carrying a tray filled with an assortment of sweets and two mugs. He didn’t think it was possible to love her any more than he already did but she certainly proved him wrong. His heart swells at the sight of her, trying so hard to accommodate him.

  
“I pretty much like everything at this bakery.”

  
“It’s a good thing I can sneak you plenty of snacks then,” she says, proud. Chat doesn’t bother to tell her he gets free snacks as Adrien as well.

  
“I knew there was a reason I kept you around.”

  
Marinette places the tray on the small table and gestures for him to sit on the lounger. He opts to sit on the ground, letting Marinette take the seat instead.

  
“Mmhm. You knew that putting up with me as Ladybug would one day lead you to unlimited sweets.”

  
“It was a struggle, having to pretend you were the most amazing person to ever exist, but I persevered in the name of cookies.” Chat grabs a macaron and the “World’s Best Dad” mug which has, to Chat’s never-ending delight, hot cocoa in it.

  
“I guess now that I know your secret there’s no point in continuing being Ladybug. Might as well retire while I’m still young and beautiful.”

  
Chat chokes on his sip, coughing and spluttering as he tries to contain his laughter. “Gosh, I don’t know what I’d do if you actually stopped being Ladybug. Probably cry forever.”

  
Marinette snickers into her mug. “Lucky you, that’s not happening anytime soon.”

  
Chat grins up at her. The lights from city around them cast a sort of angelic glow around Marinette and Chat can’t breathe for a second.

  
“Lucky me.” For the first time in a while, he finds he actually means it.


	3. three.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Chat and Ladybug get into a fight.

After the third night Chat visits her, Marinette decides to take down all her Adrien posters. She feels rude keeping the boy on her balcony when she has a cozy, warm room they could hang out in but she would never welcome him there with the posters. She can’t even think of what Chat would say if he ever saw them.

“You got number 7 wrong.” Chat is laying on her carpet, his legs propped on her chaise, as he reads over her math homework. Despite her protests, checking her homework has become one of Chat Noir’s favorite things to do in her room. 

“I did?” Marinette frowns and wheels her chair over to him. 

He hums in agreement and hands over her notebook. Marinette looks it over quickly but doesn’t see anything wrong. 

“Are you sure?”

“What’s four times eight?”

“Thirty-two.”

“What’d you write?”

Marinette glances down and lo and behold, she wrote forty-two, which threw off the rest of her equation. “Oops. Thanks for the _cat_ -ch.”

“No problem. That’s what I’m here for.”

“You visit my room every night to _spot_ my careless math errors.”

“Marinette,” Chat whines as he kicks his legs off the chaise and sits up. “It’s not fair when you make too many puns. My poor heart can’t handle it.”

Marinette slips off her chair to sit next to Chat on the floor, letting her shoulder brush against his. “Sorry, you must be rubbing off on me.”

Chat grins and wraps his arm around her shoulders. The cuddling should be weird but their first meeting had their bodies pressed against each other, trapped in her yo-yo; touching always came naturally to them. Plus, she feels calmer when they cuddle, safer. She wonders what Chat thinks about their constant need to be touching each other but she doesn’t know how to bring it up. 

“You’re in a really good mood today,” he notes.

“I guess I am.” 

“Any reason why?”

“Am I not allowed to be happy?”

“You’re always happy. You seem extra happy today. There’s a certain buzz about you.”

She’s reluctant to tell Chat the reason for her good mood though. It doesn’t seem right—like she’s breaking an unspoken rule—telling Chat about her huge crush on Adrien. He keeps pressing her about it though so she relents. “I talked to my crush today. He actually started the conversation and everything. It was nice.”

Adrien had started talking to her more and more the past couple of weeks. It’s both exhilarating and terrifying but Marinette is trying really, really hard not to get her hopes up.

“Your… crush?”

“Yeah.” Marinette shifts uncomfortably in his arms. She definitely shouldn’t have brought it up. She can’t peg why talking about it with him is awkward, but it most certainly is and she wants this conversation done with. “He’s just some boy who goes to my school.”

“Oh.” There’s a lull and Marinette tries to think of a way to change the subject but Chat keeps pushing on. “He must be pretty awesome if he’s caught your attention.”

“He is,” she admits. “He’s so sweet and smart and good at, like, everything and he’s really cute and… anyway, enough about my lackluster love life. Is there anyone in your life, Chat Noir?”

“You know you’re the only lady for me, Bug,” he says with a wink. 

Marinette rolls her eyes but lets it slide and changes the subject. After all, there’s still a line that they precariously drew, one that she can’t cross until she knows his identity too.  
“Wanna play UMS III for a bit?”

“Is that even a question?” Chat says eagerly. They untangle themselves and head over to Marinette’s computer. Her new wallpaper is an action shot of the four heroes taking on an akuma. Whoever took it got a really good angle of her. “Nice background.”

“Thanks. I thought I should give the heroes of Paris my support.”

“It’s nice to feel appreciated.”

They only get through a game and a half when Chat’s baton starts going off. 

“Rena?” 

“Thank goodness! There’s an akuma down by the Seine and Ladybug and Bee aren’t answering my calls. Come quick!”

Chat hangs up and looks at Marinette. “I guess we’re gonna have to put a pause on our game. Duty calls, M’Lady.”

Marinette beams at him. “Let’s do this! Tikki, spots on!”

“So cool,” Chat whispers.

“You’ve already seen me transform, Chaton.” Ladybug starts toward the skylight 

“I know but it’s still cool!” He follows her out the room and the pair rush off to face today’s villain. 

When they get there, there are fires everywhere and Rena Rouge is dangling from a rooftop. “About time,” she exclaims. “Help me so we can beat this guy up.”

Ladybug smirks and races to the roof to pull up her teammate. “We’re not here to beat anyone up, Rena. We’re here to help him.”

“He made it personal. You can help him, I just want to get one good punch in before you fix everything.”

“Aren’t you the one always saying—”

“Look out,” Chat yells, tackling the girls to ground. Ladybug feels a strong force of heat zip by them. 

“Thanks for the save, Chat,” Ladybug says, trying to free herself from the cage that is Chat Noir. 

“You have to be more careful.” He completely ignores Ladybug’s struggle, choosing instead to crush both girls under his weight. “You can’t keep getting so distracted.”

This ruffles her feathers more than she’d like to admit. How can Chat Noir, of all people, lecture her on being more careful? The boy is a walking disaster who is far too rash and impulsive and spends half their time fighting cracking jokes.

Ladybug pushes Chat off her and wobbles to her feet, both knees cracking in the process. “That’s rich, coming from you.”

Chat stands up too, leaving them just inches apart. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“ _I_ need to be more careful? You’re always throwing yourself into danger and never think about the consequences. Besides, I can do whatever I want. Who are you to tell me to be more careful?”

“I do what I have to do to protect you and civilians. You were the one having a chat with Rena Rouge, leaving you defenseless.”

“I would have been fine.”

“He shot a fireball at you!”

“It wouldn’t have even hit me, it was too high!”

“It might have!”

“Oh, my gosh. Are you always going to be this infuriating now?”

“I’m not being the infuriating one right now.”

“Really? Because up until a few days ago, this never would have been a problem. So tell me, Chat Noir, what is this really about?” Ladybug steps forward and lifts her head even higher, bringing them nose to nose. 

“Um, I don’t really know what’s happening but now is not the time for your lover’s spat,” Rena says from her spot on the ground.

Ladybug flinches and leaps back. She completely forgot about Rena and the akuma. “You’re right,” she says. “Let’s wrap this up quickly.” She leaps off the building, following the trail of fire, and doesn’t give Chat a second glance.

\--

Marinette is tempted to ignore the consistent knocking and scratching but she knows that’s just her stubbornness talking. It’s always better to talk through an argument than to let it sit and fester. At least, that’s what Tikki keeps telling her.

“Can’t I avoid talking to him for one more day,” Marinette asks.

“What good will that do?”

“It’ll let me stay angry for an extra day.”

“I’m going to let him in.”

“Ugh, no! I’ll do it.” Marinette heads to her bed, grumbling ‘stupid Kwami’ under her breath.

“Hey,” Chat says, dropping onto her bed. “I didn’t think you were gonna let me in.”

“I almost didn’t.”

They sit across from each other on her bed, cross-legged and tense. They’ve never really had big arguments before. 

The seconds tick by.

“So, about before,” Chat finally says. 

“Yes?”

Chat sighs and rubs the back of his neck. “I’m sorry for getting overprotective. I didn’t think knowing who you are would affect me this much but… I let it get to me.”

“I’ve always been Ladybug. Everything we’ve done together has been me. You can’t treat me like a delicate flower just because I’m Marinette, too.”

“I know. It’s just… you’re so tiny, Marinette. I always… you’re really…” Chat takes a deep breath. “Now that I know who you are, it’s not just Ladybug who is in trouble when we fight, it’s Marinette. I’ll try to be better about unnecessary freak outs but it might take me a while. I don’t want anything to happen to you.”

“I don’t want anything to happen to you, either. But we can’t let our feelings or emotions cloud our judgments. And next time I’ll try to be more alert when there’s an akuma around. I always let my guard down with Rena, I don’t know why.”

“If I didn’t know any better, I’d say she was your favorite teammate.”

“Oh hush, you,” Marinette says, relieved that the atmosphere feels more relaxed. “It’s you and me, always.”

Chat grins at her and scooches closer. “So, tell me more about this crush of yours.”

“Ugh,” Marinette groans. “You just got back on my good side, do you really want to ruin it?”

“What? You don’t want to talk about this boy you like?”

“I already told you about him. He’s—he’s really nice.”

“Nice,” Chat repeats.

“Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever met anyone with such a caring and gentle demeanor. He genuinely wants the best for everyone, you know? Even some of the worst bullies, he’s there for them if they need it.” Marinette plays with a loose thread from her comforter. She doesn’t like talking about Adrien with Chat Noir but now that she started, she’s finding it difficult to stop. “You just don’t see people like that anymore. And he’s always so busy, doing a million things, but he still finds the time to help when someone asks. And he never complains about how overworked he is, either. 

“Gosh, and he has so many friends—of course he does, how can anyone dislike him—but he still seems lonely, sometimes. Like, he’s surrounded by people but there’s still something missing? And sometimes I’m so tempted to just go up to him and wrap him in a huge hug and let him know I care and I’m there for him. I never do, obviously but if I could, I would hug him all the time.”

“Why can’t you?”

Marinette hangs her head in her hands and groans. “I can barely talk to him, let alone find the courage to hug him. Can we stop talking about this now?”

“Sure. I should probably head home anyway.”

Marinette whips her head up. “So soon?” 

“The akuma used up all my time. I wouldn’t have even stopped by but I wanted to make sure we were okay. We are okay, right?”

“Of course we are, Kitty.”

“Okay, well, have a good night. Good luck with your crush!”

“Stop bringing up my crush,” Marinette says, flinging a pillow at him as he leaps to the balcony. She can hear him snicker before he takes off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol this chapter was supposed to have a lot of akuma-fighting. I am clearly not here for the the battles. As always, find me on tumblr (chelseaapproved) so I can fangirl with people!


	4. four.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Adrien is an oblivious idiot. What else is new.

Adrien cannot, for the life of him, figure out who Marinette has a crush on. Maybe it’s his own bias but he can’t find any boy who fits Marinette’s description, nor has he seen her flirt with anyone. It’s frustrating, really, because as long as he can’t find her crush, he’s holding on to the stupid hope that it’s him. 

It wouldn’t be too much of a stretch, would it? He’s nice and busy and lonely. And Marinette does have a tendency to get tongue-tied around him.

But she’s Marinette. She was out of his league before he even knew she was Ladybug. It doesn’t seem possible that she would even think about Adrien in a romantic light. 

“You’re staring at Marinette again,” Chloé says at lunch, causing Adrien to lurch in his seat. She isn’t his favorite lunch companion but Chloé calmed down a lot since collège and Adrien is appreciative of their restored friendship.

“No I’m not.” Adrien tears into his sandwich as a distraction.

“You really are.”

There’s no point in denying it; Chloé is well-aware of his feelings for Marinette, even if they’ve never actually talked about it. Instead, Adrien decides to use his friend’s gossiping abilities to his advantage. 

“Hey, do you know if Marinette likes anyone?”

“You’re kidding me, right,” Chloé asks flatly.

“Um, no?”

“I’m not having this conversation right now.” 

To Adrien’s shock, Chloé rises from her seat, grabbing her tray, and walks over to Sabrina’s table. Confused, Adrien tries to call her back but he apparently insulted her enough to cause her to abandon him for the rest of lunch. He waits another minute before deciding that she definitely isn’t coming back and he might as well go somewhere else so he doesn’t eat alone. 

Naturally, his feet lead him to Marinette’s table. She’s sitting with a group of people—Alya, Nino, Mylene, Ivan, Juleka, Rose, and a few others Adrien doesn’t know personally—and it intimidates him a bit. Marinette is so popular, she could get any guy she wants. Thankfully, most of the people at the table don’t even realize he’s standing there. 

“Is it okay if I sit here? Chloé ditched me.” Adrien addresses Marinette but Nino’s the one who responds.

“Of course, dude! I don’t get why you were eating with her in the first place.”

“She’s not as bad as she used to be,” Adrien defends as he forces his way next to Marinette. “You even said it yourself.”

“Whatever, man. It’s your life.”

Adrien chooses to ignore Nino’s jab at his oldest friend and instead turns pointedly to Marinette. “How are you, Marinette?”

She startles next to him and her face turns a cute light pink. “I’m good. H-how are you?”

She looks so pretty today, with her hair cascading her face in delicate waves and a dress she most certainly designed herself. He mentioned idly the other day that she looks pretty with her hair down and Adrien can’t help but wonder if that’s the reason she kept her hair loose. It’s out of his mouth before he can control it. “Better now that I’m with you.”

Marinette’s eyes widen and Alya chokes on her apple from across the table. 

“Um, I—to go!” Marinette shoots up from the table. “Alya?”

Alya sighs but gets up as well and together the two girls retreat from the table to whisper to each other under a nearby tree. That’s the second time Adrien scared away a friend in less than 10 minutes. He should win a medal.

“Dude,” Nino chuckles, “I think you broke Marinette.” 

“I didn’t mean to,” Adrien grumbles. That’s what he gets for getting his hopes up. Every time he falls prey to the false notion that Adrien might be Marinette’s secret crush, she acts like that around him. Running away is one of the worst reactions to flirting he could think of. 

“Why don’t you just ask her out?”

“Ooh! You’re going to ask Marinette out? That’s so romantic,” Rose squeals, quite loudly, attracting the attention of the rest of the table. It’s unfair, really; Rose was talking to Juleka just seconds ago.

Adrien can feel his face growing warmer with the attention. He doesn’t mind attention in certain situations but talking about his unrequited love for the most unattainable girl he knows is not his idea of a good time. “I’m not asking her out.”

“You guys would make a really cute couple,” Mylene says.

“I appreciate that but I’m not going to ask her out.”

“Who’s Adrien asking out?” Adrien nearly falls out of his seat at Alya’s voice. 

“No one!” He turns around and sure enough, there’s Marinette, pink-faced and gorgeous, watching with a look he can’t decipher. Adrien wishes they stayed away for a bit longer. “I’m not asking anyone out. There is no asking out happening. I don’t even know why we’re still talking about how much I’m not asking anyone out.”

“Methinks the boy doth protest too much,” Alya says. Adrien prays for the ground to open up beneath him and suck him in. 

“Leave him alone,” Marinette pipes up. “If he doesn’t want to talk about it, he doesn’t have to.”

Adrien practically melts. Leave it to Marinette to defend him even outside of their masks. 

“Thanks, Marinette.”

She blushes but smiles at him before sitting in her spot next to him. The table thankfully lets the subject drop, most likely because Marinette is back and they know when to stop. He’s still appreciative of her help though. She’s so nice. 

“Hey, we should hang out sometime,” Adrien says.

“We—we should?”

“Yeah! I’m still not allowed to have friends over but maybe we could go to the park or—”

“I just got a sick new entertainment system installed,” Nino interjects, completely oblivious to Adrien’s true motivations. For someone who was just trying to set them up, Nino sure could be daft sometimes. “You guys should come check it out, maybe play some games.”

“I’d love to,” Alya says eagerly. Adrien is honestly kind of confused about Alya and Nino’s relationship. It seemed like they were heading somewhere for a while and then they suddenly stopped. But Alya always seems so eager to spend time with Nino… Relationships are weird. “What day?”

Nino shrugs. “Whenever my boy is free.”

Three pairs of eyes turn to Adrien. “Uh, I guess I’m free Thursday?”

“Awesome,” Alya exclaims. “You’re coming too, right Marinette?”

“I guess?”

“Sweet,” Nino says, flashing a grin at Alya. 

Adrien tries to catch Marinette’s eye to let her know he’s glad she’s coming but she ignores him for the rest of lunch.

\--

“You look far too pensive for this time of evening.”

Queen Bee is sitting on her perch on the Eiffel Tower, looking her role of a queen. Her ponytail is as neat as ever, her posture picture perfect. There’s something about the way she holds herself that makes Chat feel bad about himself. All three girls hold their heads high and mighty but Bee gives off the aura of being above everyone else.

He thinks she’s an awesome superhero, if not a bit unconventional, but he could never seem to open up to her the way he can with Ladybug and Rena. 

“I’m fine. Sorry for being so quiet,” Chat says. He lifts his head up, trying to imitate Bee’s stance but she sees through him in an instant.

“I couldn’t care less about what’s bothering you. But we have nothing else to do for the next half hour so you can talk to me about it if you’d like.” Her tone is clipped, bored. If Chat didn’t know any better, he would have believed her words at face value. But there’s something about her that reminds him of Chloè—it’s probably the hair—and the way she tries so hard to pretend she doesn’t care about anything. 

“What do you and Ladybug talk about when you patrol together?”

Bee shoots him a look. “I don’t know. Akumas, Hawkmoth, saving Paris. Why?”

“Okay, but… you’re both girls, right?”

“I don’t think I like where this is going but I’ll bite. Yes, obviously we’re both girls.”

“Do you ever…gossip?”

“Gossip,” Bee repeats, flat.

“Yeah. About—I don’t know—celebrities and nails a—and boys.”

Bee squints at him. “You know I have a girlfriend, right?”

“Boys _and girls_ , then.”

“Sometimes. Ladybug keeps things professional, though. Rena is much more likely to talk about that stuff than Ladybug.”

“Has Ladybug ever mentioned me?”

“What are we, twelve?”

Chat can feel his face heating up but he trudges on. If no one at school can help him, maybe Bee or Rena can. It’s entirely possible she accidentally mentioned the name of the boy she likes to one of them. 

“It’s a simple question,” he says.

“Of course she mentions you. She talks about you all the time. Is that a surprise?”

Maybe it shouldn’t be, but it is a surprise. Warmth fills him and if he wasn’t blushing before he certainly is now. Even if she never sees him in anything but a platonic way, it’s always nice hearing that she cares about him. 

“Has she ever talked about any boys she might like?”

Queen Bee stares at him for a full ten seconds, letting Chat anxiously await her answer. Just when he’s about to crack and beg for her to respond, she starts talking. 

“You’re kidding me, right,” she asks. 

“Uh, no?”

Bee looks up to the sky and shakes her head slowly. “Why am I surrounded by idiots?”

“What did I do,” Chat asks defensively. 

“The fact that you’re even asking that question is further proving my point.”

“Just forget I even said anything,” Chat says, annoyed and embarrassed. This is exactly why he doesn’t normally open up to her. 

“Gladly.”

They sit in awkward silence for a while, neither one willing to break it out of sheer stubbornness. It’s not fair to force someone to talk about something and then call them names immediately after. 

“I have a friend,” she finally says, just a minute before their patrol time is up, “who is completely in love with this girl. And the girl has the largest, most mortifying crush on him. But instead of doing anything about it, they keep pining away after each other.”

Chat looks at her curiously. 

“It’s annoying to watch. No one wants to deal with all their pointless moping and angst.” She stands up and readies herself to take off. “Don’t be like my friend. It’s beneath you.”

With that she leaps off, soaring through the night sky. Chat watches for a moment, confused. Her story was all well and good but it didn’t apply to him at all. He’s helplessly in love with a girl who doesn’t return his love. If he could act on his feelings he would in a heartbeat. 

He gives himself another minute to try to make sense of Queen Bee’s words but she was always a weird one, so he doesn’t fret on it too long. Rising from his spot, Chat cracks his neck and takes out his staff to head out. He knows he should head home and get to sleep early tonight but the call to the bakery is too strong to resist so he sets off to Marinette’s, hoping she’ll have some croissants for him to nibble on before bed.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me on my tumblr at chelseaapproved!


	5. five.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Our favorite cat has a bad weekend. Luckily, Marinette will always be there to cheer him up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you all for your comments on last chapter! I'm glad so many of you liked Chloe :)

“Would you rather lick the floor of the metro or lick a public toilet?”

“Ew! Neither!”

“You have to choose one, M.”

“I wouldn’t want to do either of those though.” Marinette looks up from painting her toes to glare at Alya. 

“That’s the whole point of the game,” Alya groans, clearly frustrated with Marinette. “I don’t think I’ve ever met someone so bad at this.”

“You keep giving me gross ones!”

“Ugh fine.” Alya switches from the green polish to the blue one. She’s going for some fancy marble effect that Marinette is jealous of. For all Marinette is creative and artistic, she has yet to master the art of painting nails. “Would you rather marry Adrien or have a successful career designing clothes?”

Marinette feels her face warm up at the idea of marrying Adrien. She might be a little pathetic. “Both,” she says, once she gets control of her pounding heart.

“You can only choose one.”

“But they’re my two life goals, how am I supposed to choose?”

“As previously stated, multiple times, that is the point of the game. It’s not supposed to be easy. How have you never played this before?”

“I don’t know,” Marinette shrugs. “Can we play something else? I’m clearly not cut out for this game.”

Alya definitely says something but Marinette doesn’t pay attention—she’s too distracted by the very familiar ‘thunk’ she hears on her balcony. Marinette freezes, her back stiffening as she realizes she forgot to lock her sunroof. Which means—

“Good evening, Mari! How are… you…?” Chat stares wide-eyed at a slack-jawed Alya. 

Oh no.

“Chat Noir,” Alya exclaims, breaking the silence. “What are you doing here?”

“I—er,” he glances at Marinette, panicked. 

“Cookies,” Marinette blurts out. 

“Cookies,” Alya repeats.

“Yes! He, um, orders cookies from us sometimes. And if he gets here after my parents go to bed, he’ll come up here to get them!”

“Right,” Chat says, throwing Marinette a look that clearly tells her the lie sucks. “So, do you have my cookies ready for me?”

“Um.” Marinette glances around her room but there are obviously no cookies to give him. “I must have gotten distracted by our sleepover that I forgot to bring them up. I’ll be right back.”

“I can get them if you want,” Chat says quickly. 

“No, you stay there. Just give me a second!”

Marinette flings open the trap door and races down the stairs. They usually have a few sweets at the end of the day but most of their leftovers get donated to soup kitchens and homeless shelters. She scrambles to find a few cookies and rummages through the cabinets to find an extra box to put them in. 

She grabs a marker and writes ‘For Chat Noir’ in fancy calligraphy. It’s already been too long so she doesn’t bother with string or ribbon. 

Rushing up the stairs, she can hear Alya questioning Chat. Marinette flinches before bursting into the room. Chat is awkwardly standing in the middle of the room with Alya beaming up at him. 

“Here are your cookies! Sorry to keep you waiting so long.”

“No harm done little lady.” Chat grabs the box out of Marinette’s hand, brushing her fingers as he does so. It sends a tingle down her spine that she ignores. “The sweets from here are well worth the wait.”

“Right. Well, I hope you enjoy them. Bye!” She all but pushes Chat back toward the bed so he can escape through the sunroof. 

“Don’t forget our interview,” Alya calls as Chat starts up the ladder. Marinette winces; Alya must have cornered him into an interview while she was getting cookies. She makes a mental note to bring it up to him the next time they meet. 

“I won’t. Take care of yourselves. Thanks again for the cookies!” Then he’s gone.

There’s a beat of silence.

“How long has Chat Noir been visiting you and why haven’t you told me earlier?” 

\--

Chat doesn’t visit for the rest of the weekend. It should be good because after the very awkward and uncomfortable conversation with Alya, they spend the entire weekend hanging in Marinette’s room. Marinette thinks Alya was hoping to catch another glimpse of Chat but thankfully the cat knew to stay away.

Unfortunately, Ladybug is able to beat the only akuma of the weekend before Chat even shows up. Normally, Marinette would consider this a good thing but it’s been days since she last got to speak to him—really speak to him, without any third-party members present—and she misses him. 

“Hey Marinette.”

Marinette startles and jumps in her seat, hitting her knee against the bottom of her desk. Already embarrassed, Marinette can feel her face growing warm while Adrien watches on with concern.

“Are you okay,” Adrien asks.

“Y-yeah,” she forces out. “You’re fine. I mean, I’m fine. Me. Is fine.”

“Okay…” he says with a hesitant smile. One of these days Marinette is going to have a conversation with Adrien that doesn’t make her want to bash her head in a wall. “Uh, anyway, I was wondering if you had any plans for lunch?”

Marinette blinks at him. “Me?”

“Yeah,” he says, rubbing the back of his neck. “Would you—Do you have any plans?”

Marinette looks around but everyone has already fled from the classroom. She has no lifelines. “I—I was just going to go back home. Alya and Nino are going on some weird date-not-a-date thing and I usually eat at home anyway because the food is fresher and warmer and it gives me an opportunity to talk to my parents. But I don’t have to do that! I am always open to other things and eating with new people and doing whatever during lunch. I mean, not whatever, I still want to eat but I just meant I don’t need to eat at home.”

Adrien stares at her, a small smile forming on his lips that gets her heart pounding. He’s too beautiful for her to handle.

“I have to go home and wanted to know if you’d mind coming with me?”

The next few minutes are unclear to Marinette—she thinks she might have blacked out—but suddenly she’s in the back of the limo with Adrien beaming at her. 

“Thanks again for coming,” Adrien says when he catches her eye. 

Even in her daze, Marinette can recognize it’s a weird thing to say. “You don’t need to thank someone for hanging out with a friend,” she says.

Adrien shrugs. “I know but… I had a rough weekend and this morning was even worse and I just… really needed a friendly face?” 

Marinette’s heart goes out for the boy sitting next to her. Her biggest regret about her interactions with Adrien is that he seems like the kind of person who really needs a friend but she is wholly underqualified to be that person for him.

“I’m sure Nino would have rescheduled his thing with Alya for you,” she says.

Adrien looks down at his lap. “I didn’t want to ask him to do that just for me. Besides, he’s still not allowed in my house…”

Marinette closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. She is going to get this out properly the first time. “Adrien,” she starts. When he snaps his eyes to her, she feels bold enough to hold his hand. “Friends like helping each other. And Nino, especially, is a wonderful human being who will always be there for you. You could have asked him for help. But I’m glad you reached out to me.”

He squeezes her hand. “You’re really important to me, Marinette.”

And here comes the blushing. She pulls her hand out of his and anxiously plays with her hair. “Ahh… y-you’re important to me, too.”

Adrien’s colossal bodyguard thankfully cuts off their conversation by opening the door. Marinette squeaks out a ‘thanks’ but the man stays stoic and silent as usual.

Adrien leads Marinette to the dining room where two plates are waiting for them. He must have called ahead and asked the chef to prepare a meal for her as well and it just… melts her. She doesn’t think she is going to survive this afternoon. 

They sit in silence for a few minutes, picking at their salad. 

“D-do you want to talk about your weekend,” Marinette finally asks. She stays looking at her food because that’s the only way she can have this conversation without panicking. 

“It just wasn’t a good weekend,” Adrien shrugs. “Not much to talk about.”

“Okay,” Marinette says. “I’m here if you want to talk.”

“Thanks, Marinette,” he says with more gratitude than she can handle. This entire lunch is more than she can handle, in all honesty. 

They lapse back into silence. Marinette wracks her brain for something to say and break the awkwardness between them but her mind is unsurprisingly blank. 

“My father overbooked me again this weekend so I barely had time to breathe, let alone relax,” Adrien says. Marinette puts down her fork, intent to give Adrien her full attention. “I was supposed to go over Nino’s to help him test out some new software he downloaded but I had to bail last minute. He said he understood but there’s only so many times you can ditch someone before they give up on you, you know?”

“I’m sorry you missed out on the weekend. Nino understands your father is…particular,” Marinette settles for a much gentler word than what she’s thinking. “We all do and none of us judge you for it.”

“I feel like a horrible friend.”

“You’re not. I bet if I called Nino right now he would agree that you’re an amazing friend, Adrien.”

His cheeks turn the faintest tinge of pink, which is absolutely adorable and has Marinette blushing like crazy herself. 

“You’re an amazing friend, too,” he mumbles. 

Her face grows even hotter so she decides she should move on from that particular subject. “Y-you also mentioned today wasn’t too great either.”

Adrien sighs. “It’s stupid.”

“It’s not stupid.”

“I have a fencing match tomorrow and Father said he would try to make it this time but when I woke up this morning, he was gone on a week-long trip.”

Marinette stares in horror at the poor boy in front of her. She can’t imagine what it must be like to live with a father like Gabriel Agreste. Super-talented and awe-inspiring fashion designer, but unfairly neglectful father. 

“I’m so sorry. That must feel awful.”

“I’m used to it.”

“Is there anything I can do,” Marinette asks. 

“Just being here is enough,” he says. Somehow, Marinette doesn’t faint on spot. 

\--

Despite the _incident_ on Friday, Chat drops into her room without any warning. She supposes _he_ isn’t the one forced to interact with a suspicious Alya all the time now. 

“Hey,” she says, barely glancing up from the banner she’s working on.

Chat leaps off the bed and stands next to her. “What are you working on,” he asks.

“My friend has a meet tomorrow,” she explains, “and his family isn’t going so my friends and I are going to go and root for him instead.”

“You’re making a banner for him?” His voice sounds off but Marinette doesn’t bother with it.

“Of course. What kind of fan would I be if I didn’t make a sign?”

“You’re so nice,” he says. “I can’t believe you’d do this for him.”

“It’s not a big deal. I’d do it for any of my friends.”

“You’re a really wonderful person, Mari.” 

Marinette puts down her banner and properly looks at him. He has tears in his eyes and is looking at her like there’s no one else in the world that matters. 

“Chat, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” he says, blinking rapidly. 

“Come here.” She leads him to the chaise and pats the spot next to her to sit. He immediately sits and leans into her, letting his head rest against hers.

“What happened,” she asks.

“I needed this,” he sighs. 

“You’re making me nervous, Kitty.”

“The past few days have been crappy and I didn’t get to see you, which made it even worse. I had a friend cheer me up earlier today but I really just needed this.” He nuzzles the top of her head to drive his point home.

Marinette reaches up to scratch behind his cat ears, a spot she knows he’s weak for. “You want to talk about it?”

“Not really. It wasn’t anything bad and I already talked to my friend.”

“Want to watch anime and cuddle on my bed?”

“Absolutely, I do,” Chat says, leaping off the chaise. 

Marinette grins at him and grabs her laptop while he runs up to the bed. She glances at the half-finished banner she abandoned, then back at Chat. It’s going to be a late night, but both her boys deserve it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, find me on tumblr at chelseaapproved.tumblr.com


	6. six.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> What is this akuma doing in my awkward fluff?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm going to be honest with you, I do not like this chapter. I've been working on this monster for far too long and I know that if I don't upload something, this story is never going to be finished. When my life is less hectic and I have the time/mental capacity to fix it it, I'm going to go back and edit it. For now, I hope you can enjoy. My next chapter will be uploaded later this week to make up for the long wait and subsequent shitty chapter. It'll be a lot better than this one!
> 
> PS- I'm going back and changing Alya's miraculous name to Rena Rouge.

“They definitely are,” Alya says firmly, her eyes filled with fire.

“I’m positive they’re not. You’re just embarrassing yourself now,” Chloé says dismissively.

“I’m pretty sure I have a better understanding of them; I run the Ladyblog.”

“Oh please, your pathetic excuse for a website is hardly a basis for your claim. Besides, you barely update it anymore. It’s more fan-run than anything else.”

“I’ve been busy. That doesn’t mean I’m any less aware of what Chat Noir and Ladybug are up to.”

“Uh, what’s going on,” Adrien interjects cautiously, glancing at a silent Marinette backed against the wall. Her knuckles are turning white from gripping her purse. 

Chloé scoffs. “This one,” Chloé says, pointing to Alya, “thinks that she’s a Ladybug expert but can’t even recognize that she’s not dating Chat Noir.”

“What do you think, Adrien,” Alya says. 

Adrien looks at Marinette. The second their eyes meet, her face starts turning pink. Right. She probably doesn’t want to hear her friends casually discuss her dating life…

“I never really thought about it,” he lies, rubbing his neck. 

“They’re obviously not dating yet, though, right Adrien,” Chloé persists.

“Wait, yet?”

“Well, they’re clearly madly in love with each other and are just being stupid about it.”

Adrien has no response to that and joins Marinette in her blushing game.

“Wait,” Marinette speaks up. “You guys are practically on the same side on this. Why are you even arguing?”

“Because they’re not dating yet,” Chloé spits. 

“What do you think, Marinette,” Adrien asks because he is a little shit and can’t help himself. 

Her face grows redder at his questioning. “I, uh, don’t think they’re like that at all.”

He doesn’t know what he expected; he already knew she doesn’t have feelings for Chat but hearing her say it out loud, so simply, turns his stomach sour. 

“Oh,” he forces out. “N-not even a little?”

“Marinette is probably just jealous because she wants Chat to herself, right Marinette?” Alya says.

Marinette glares at Alya. “How many times do I have to tell you, there’s nothing going on between me and Chat Noir.”

“Ew,” Chloé says. “Why would Chat Noir ever want to date Marinette?”

“More importantly,” Marinette says, “How can you argue Ladybug and Chat Noir are dating but also think Chat Noir has the hots for me?”

“Maybe he has a type,” Alya shrugs.

“I doubt Chat Noir would be interested in a random civilian,” Adrien interjects nervously. “Especially not if he is actually dating Ladybug.”

“Are you implying Marinette isn’t good enough to date a superhero,” Alya asks.

“No! Chat Noir would be the luckiest person if he got to date Marinette! I didn’t mean he shouldn’t want to date her. Everyone should want to date her, she’s amazing!” Adrien realizes that Marinette is still standing right there, staring at him with big blue eyes. He backtracks. “Not that I want to date you, Marinette. Well, I wouldn’t want to not date you but—”

The bell cuts him off and saves him from further humiliation.

Marinette awkwardly waves at him before scurrying off with Alya. 

“That was even more pathetic than usual,” Chloé says.

“I know,” Adrien says despondently before dragging himself to class.

\--

The ground starts shaking around third period. It could just be a normal earthquake but being Chat Noir has put Adrien on alert for any sort of disturbance. Regardless, the tremors continue to get worse and pretty soon they hear the announcement that class is cancelled and everyone should report to the gym for safety. Everyone grabs their stuff and joins the large group of students in the hallway as they all shuffle toward the gym.

Naturally, that’s when the akuma shows up, bright green and cackling.

Adrien lets himself get swept up by the stampeding crowd and soon enough finds himself outside. He falters for a second, sweeping his eyes over the mass of students sprinting away, hoping to catch a glimpse of his friends. He spies Nino hauling a frantic Alya away and breathes a bit easier. 

Slipping away from any bystanders, Adrien finds an enclosed nook to transform. The school is slowly crumbling but he can’t focus on that right now. Chat Noir can do more than Adrien can. 

“Can’t it wait,” Plagg whines. “There are three other heroes, you don’t need me right away.”

“You can be lazy later.”

“No I can’t. You’re gonna visit your girlfriend tonight.”

“She’s not my girlfriend. Also, we don’t have time for this. Plagg, claws out!”

Plagg doesn’t get enough time to complain some more. Instead, he’s sucked into the ring, allowing Adrien to become Chat Noir. 

Chat leaps out of his hiding spot and immediately tries to figure out where the akuma stormed off to. In his search, he notices Marinette’s bag laying on the ground near some bushes. Heart pounding, Chat cautiously picks it up and opens it. Wide blue eyes peer up at him.

“Crap,” he mutters. “Where’s Mari?”

“I don’t know,” Tikki replies. “She was running out with everyone else and then tripped and flung me over here.”

“Okay. Okay. She’s probably looking for you so I’ll hold onto you for now and try calling her cell.”

“Her cell phone is in here.”

“Of course it is.”

“Chat!” Chat whips around, hiding the tiny purse behind his back. Rena Rouge has tears streaming down her face, which puts Chat on edge. He’s seen Ladybug and Queen Bee cry but never Rena Rouge.

“What’s wrong?”

“Th-there are still civilians in there,” Rena Rouge says. "There's no way in or out, I already checked." 

Chat’s blood runs cold. He glances over at the school slowly caving in on itself. The longer they wait the more likely no one will make it. He doesn’t know whether Miraculous Ladybug can bring back the dead and he never wants to find out. “How many?”

“I don’t know! At least five... There’s one girl who—she was out already and safe but she saw there were people trapped and she ran back in…”

“Do you know who any of them are?” He knows the answer before she even gives it. Who else would do something so stupid? He grips Marinette’s bag, still held behind him, in anticipation. 

“You might know her, the girl who ran in—Marinette Dupain-Cheng.” 

Chat doesn’t even respond. Storing the bag in one of his pockets, he races to the front of the school and calls for Cataclysm, hoping he can force his way into the building. All it does is add even more dust and rubble to the mess. 

“No. No! NO!” He screams so loud his throat feels raw. Chat starts grabbing at the rocks and other debris. He will dig his way to her if he has to. 

The only thing he can hear is the beeping of his ring and the soft rumbling of the building, a constant reminder that he doesn’t have enough time. Marinette is in there, defenseless, and every rock he removes is replaced by another and another and another and another…

“Chat.” Rena Rouge places her hand on his shoulder, snapping him out of his ruminative trance. “You should head over to the akuma. Ladybug might be there already and will need one of our help. I can stay and wait for the students.”

Her words make sense but Chat ignores her anyway. Ladybug won’t be there. Ladybug is currently trapped in a collapsing school and he doesn’t know how to fix it. 

He can’t tell Rena Rouge any of that though, so he just keeps with his pointless attempts to reach Marinette. Most people were smart and evacuated the entire area, but there’s a small crowd watching him that he’s only vaguely aware of. He really hopes Nino was able to drag Alya far away enough so they’re safe and she’s not here recording his breakdown. 

“Chat you’re going to detransform soon,” Rena Rouge says. “Maybe you should release your transformation and let your kwami eat so you can come back sooner.”

“No,” Chat says. “Marinette is in there, I can’t leave her.”

“Stop,” Rena Rouge says, her voice broken. “Marinette will be okay. They all will. Ladybug will fix everything.”

“Chat?” His heart stops at the distant sound of her voice.

“Marinette?” 

“There’s a group of us here. I think I know a way to get out but you need to back up, okay?”

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, obviously.” He can hear the eye-roll in her voice, even if he still can’t see her. “Move back and get out of the way.”

“As you wish, My L—Marinette.” Chat backs up, shaking with nerves. She’s okay. She’s alive and has a plan. Of course she has a plan, it’s Marinette, Ladybug. If anyone could get out of that doomed situation it’d be her.

There seems to be a lot of chaos going on inside the collapsing building. Marinette is shouting orders Chat can only sort of make out above the sound of moving rocks. 

“Chat Noir you have less than a minute before you turn back,” Rena says, firm. “Get the hell out of here or so help me I will murder you.”

“But—”

“No buts. Go.”

“Yes, ma’am,” Chat says. He’s never met anyone who has such a good mom voice at his age, except maybe Alya. Both girls were very intimidating when they used it.  


Chat leaps away, careful to find a spot with a vantage point on the situation but away from any wandering eyes. More and more people are gathering around the school, which is stupid because it’s collapsing but since when were people rational?

“Must… have… cheese,” Plagg says the moment he flies out of the ring. 

“Eat quickly,” Adrien says, grabbing a piece of camembert out of his pocket. “I need to get back to Marinette.”

“Don’t you mean Ladybug?”

“She’s still Marinette right now. So eat up.”

Plagg doesn’t respond, choosing instead to indulge himself on the smelly cheese. The moment he swallows, Adrien calls for the transformation. 

He runs back to the school in time to see a small, round-faced boy crawl out of a hole in the top of the fallen rocks. Chat’s heart jumps to his throat. If that boy can get out then that means…

He waits anxiously, barely paying attention to what he’s saying to the trickle of escaping students. 

And then she’s there. Covered in dirt and scrapes and bruises but alive. Without realizing what he’s doing, without finishing his sentence, he rushes over to her and wraps her up in a huge hug. 

“You’re okay,” he mutters into her grimy hair. “Oh my gosh, you’re okay.”

“Chat, you’re hurting me.”

“Sorry,” he yelps, pulling away. 

Marinette grins up at him and rings his bell. “That’ll teach you to underestimate me.”

“Please never do anything like that ever again.”

“We’ll talk about that later,” she responds. “In the meantime, we have a much larger problem.”

“Right. Akuma.”

“Uh, actually,” she says, glancing around. “Can you take me home? I feel too weak to walk.” She feigns swooning and holy crap she’s too cute for Chat to handle. 

“Anything for my Princess.”

“Princess?”

The pair whip around to see Rena Rouge staring at them slack-jawed. 

“It-it’s just a nickname. Like you’re Foxy Lady? It doesn’t mean anything!”

“When have you ever called me ‘Foxy Lady?’”

“Um, when you’re not around.”

Rena arches an eyebrow at him. Seriously, she’s so intimidating. 

“Don’t you guys have an akuma to fix,” Marinette pipes up. 

“This conversation isn’t over,” Rena says to Chat before she takes off toward the distant rumbling. 

Chat’s pretty sure his face is red as he turns back to face Marinette. He really needs to be more careful with the way he interacts with her when there are people around.  


That thought, naturally, goes right out of his head the second he sees her grinning bashfully at him. “Your chariot awaits,” he says with a sweeping bow.

Marinette rolls her eyes but holds onto him the way she always does when they take his staff to travel, her arms wrapped snugly around his neck. 

When he drops her off at her balcony she blurts out, “I don’t know where Tikki is. I couldn’t tell you at the school because there were too many people but I have no idea where she might be and I might have dropped her when I went back in which means—”

“Mari. Calm down, I have her.” Chat reaches into his belt and produces her tiny bag. 

Relief floods Marinette’s face as she grabs the bag out of his hands. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?” She opens the bag and Tikki floats out. 

“I’ll spare you the lecture for now,” Tikki says. Chat thinks she’s using her stern voice but the kwami is such a cutie that it doesn’t come across nearly as reprimanding as it should. “Why don’t you clean up quickly before heading out?”

“But Paris needs me. I’ve let them wait long enough.”

“Two more minutes in the name of personal care won’t hurt,” Chat says.

“Whatever. I’ll see you there, Kitty.” She scratches under her chin before heading down into her room. Chat takes a second for a deep breath before joining the fight.

\--

By the time Ladybug shows up, the three other heroes have fully exhausted themselves. Queen Bee already de-transformed twice. They’ve chased the akuma all around the city, trying and failing to at least detain their villain while they waited for Ladybug to arrive. 

“About time,” Bee says. “What were you doing that was so important you had to come an hour late?”

“Sorry,” Ladybug says. “I got trapped as my civilian-self.”

“No worries, My Lady,” Chat says, grabbing her hand to kiss it. She lets him peck his lips against her polka-dotted gloves, which is still a new thing to him. He’s so used to her pushing him away and he has no idea what it means that she’s stopped. “Nothing we couldn’t handle.”

“Speak for yourself,” Bee says. “I was the only one fighting this guy from the beginning.”

“Okay,” Ladybug says, standing between them. “I’m sorry I was late. If I could have gotten here sooner, I would have. We don’t have time to stand here and argue, though, and that’s partially my fault but mostly it’s Hawkmoth’s. Now, let’s go end this.”

It’s a good speech, and one of the many reasons she’s the leader of their gang. Unfortunately, Chat doesn’t have much time to marvel over how amazing his Lady is. The akuma is back, apparently realizing that Ladybug, (and subsequently, her earrings) were here. It’s heading straight towards them, clearly intent on striking Ladybug from behind and Chat moves without even thinking. 

He pushes all three girls out of the way just in time to get hit himself. He hears Ladybug’s desperate scream. And then nothing.


	7. seven.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Marinette has a revelation.

Ladybug gets shoved aside and is forced to watch as Quaker strikes Chat. She screams out to him, unable to help in any way as he slowly collapses on the ground, unresponsive as a rock. 

Ladybug stands there, frozen, as he starts twitching convulsively and Ladybug thinks he might be having a seizure? She isn’t really sure but the akuma doesn’t give her enough time to panic because he’s ready to take Chat’s miraculous. Rena shoves Ladybug and it snaps her out of her trance.

Ladybug’s body works on autopilot, calling on her lucky charm. Which is a sock. Her entire world is depending on a stupid polka-dotted sock. The three girls fight against the akuma while Ladybug struggles to keep air in her lungs. The only thing she knows is that she needs to end this fight as quickly as possible. She needs Chat Noir back and alive. 

They bring the fight away from a broken Chat, and Ladybug manages to snatch the pencil—all that destruction from a pencil—by quickly using her sock to blindfold him. 

She calls on Miraculous Ladybug and swings off to where she left Chat, not even bothering with the akuma victim. 

He’s standing there, groaning and holding his head. 

“Chat!” She wraps him up in a hug before she even realizes what she’s doing. Immediately, she draws back and fights back a blush. 

“Ugh. I feel like my head was just split in two.”

“I’m pretty sure it kind of was.”

Chat grins down at her and holds out his fist. Marinette makes a choking sound and gives him a small fist bump.

“Gotta go! Bye!” She swings off to her house, confused, frustrated, and a little scared. 

\--

There comes a time in every girl’s life when she needs to reassess literally every single one of her life’s choices. Or, at the very least, that’s what Marinette believes. She can’t be the only person whose life has gotten so confusing that running away to Guam seems like the only realistic option. 

“Marinette, I think you’re overreacting,” Tikki says. She tries to move Marinette’s head but Marinette is quite content melding into her bed. If she becomes one with the bed, she doesn’t have to face reality. 

“I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” Marinette says, except her face is smooshed into her pillow so it comes out muffled and unclear.

“There’s nothing wrong with you.”

Marinette shifts so she can actually breathe properly. “There really is, though. I’m faulty, my parents deserve a refund.”

“Now you’re not making any sense.”

“Nothing makes sense anymore!”

Before Tikki can respond, Marinette gets a call from Alya. Marinette contemplates ignoring her but she figures the girl is probably concerned after finding out Marinette nearly died in the school.

“Can you facetime,” Alya asks without any preamble. 

“Yeah,” Marinette responds, which is how she finds herself staring at a very peeved Alya.

“Just what were you thinking, little lady?”

“I’m fine.”

“Why would you run back in there? Don’t you realize how dangerous that is? What if you didn’t get out? What if Ladybug couldn’t fix it?”

“I know, I’m sorry,” Marinette says, trying to placate the fuming redhead. “I couldn’t just stand there and do nothing. There were people in there!”

“So you leave that up to the actual superheroes! I don’t get it, you’re usually so skittish around akumas.”

“I saw one of their scared faces and I snapped,” Marinette says. 

“I think you’ve been spending too much time with your boyfriend.”

“I don’t have a boyfriend?”

“Chat Noir,” Alya exclaims. “People caught the whole debacle on camera; I saw how he reacted to you.”

Marinette’s face heats up. She really doesn’t need Alya’s inquiries about Chat, not right now. “There’s nothing going on between the two of us.”

“I really don’t think I believe that.”

“You’re my best friend. Don’t you think I’d tell you if I had a boyfriend?”

“I would have thought you’d tell me if you had a boy sneaking into your room late at night but apparently I don’t know you at all.”

Marinette sighs and shakes her head. “I am still tragically single. Sorry.”

Alya pouts at her. “You’re not even dating Adrien?”

“Ugh can we move on from this? I liked it better when you were scolding me for being reckless.”

“Come on, both boys seem to be more than a little crazy for you.”

“Chat Noir was just panicked because civilians were trapped in a collapsing building. He doesn’t have feelings for me. And Adrien…” Marinette trails off, unsure how to finish that thought. She doesn’t know what to make of Adrien’s strange behavior as of late. Alya is convinced he’s finally reciprocating her feelings but Marinette is still hesitant. 

“And Adrien is constantly two seconds away from jumping you,” Alya finishes.

“Don’t say that!”

“It’s the truth!”

“Can we please talk about anything else? Where were you while this all happened? Why didn’t you record it yourself?”

“Oh, uh. Nino pulled me away and I couldn’t get back.”

“I’m surprised you let him.”

“Anyway, I’m not done being mad with you.”

Marinette sighs but doesn’t argue. She knows she would be mad if the roles were reversed. She’s furious with Chat for being so stupid during the battle even though she knows he has more of a reason to be angry. 

“I really am sorry.”

“I felt so helpless,” Alya admits and it breaks Marinette’s heart. 

“Alya, I’m so sorry. I’ll try to be more cautious.”

“You better.”

Alya’s face gets covered by an incoming call from Adrien Agreste and Marinette shrieks.

“What’s happening? Are you ok?”

“Adrien is calling me! What do I do?”

“Answer it,” Alya says. “And tell me what he says later!”

“What should I say?”

“Start with, ‘hello’ and work from there.”

“Alya!”

“Answer the phone. I’m going now, bye!”

Marinette whimpers before accepting the call.

“H-hello,” she says, breath shaky. It’s so weird, talking to him like this after what happened earlier.

“Marinette! Hey! I heard what happened earlier and wanted to make sure you were ok.”

“Oh. Y-yeah. I’m fine. How are you?”

“I wasn’t the one who jumped into a collapsing building to save other people.” His voice sounds so proud, it makes her heart skip a beat. Not fair. Not fair at all. “You’re amazing.”

“I’m glad someone thinks so. Everyone’s just been yelling at me.”

“Don’t get me wrong, it was really stupid of you. But… you’re incredible, you know that, right?”

Marinette can only squeak. She’s eternally grateful they’re having this conversation on the phone so he can’t see how red her face must be.

“Hey, I have to go but I’m glad you’re safe. I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“Mmhm! Okay, bye!” Marinette practically shouts at the phone, having lost all control over her life. She falls back into her pillow, letting out a strangled sob.

“You’re like a god, right,” she asks Tikki. “Can you use some of your kwami power to fix my life?”

“You’re going to be fine,” Tikki says, exasperated. 

Marinette whines and turns over so her face is back in her pillow. Which is how Chat Noir finds her when he drops into the room, just barely missing Marinette’s body.

“Miss me, My Lady?”

Marinette groans. She should have run away to Guam when she had the chance. 

“Marinette?”

She huffs into her pillow before pushing herself up. Closing her eyes, Marinette takes a deep breath to prepare herself before she turns to face him.

Chat’s looking at her with concern and fondness in his bright green eyes. She lets her eyes roam over him, trying to reassure herself that he is okay, and takes in his tousled locks, cheeks tinged with pink, his solid, muscular body, and nope. Nope, nope, nope. She can’t handle this. 

“Are you alright,” he asks. 

“Y-you can’t do th-things like that,” she stutters. Oh no. She can’t be stammering around Chat Noir. That’s so embarrassing.

“Like what?” He tilts his head in confusion and it’s so cute and she hates him.

“I thought you were going to die.”

He stares at her for a second before scowling. “You can hardly lecture me, Miss Let-Me-Jump-Into-Danger-Without-My-Kwami.”

“That’s probably the worst nickname you’ve given me yet,” she says flatly. “1 out of 10. Do not recommend.”

“It’s not a joke, Marinette.”

“Aren’t you always joking?”

“Mari.”

“Look, I didn’t know I didn’t have Tikki when I went back into the school, okay? I didn’t notice dropping my bag. But I was able to get out of that situation myself.”

“And I’m perfectly fine now, so we’re even.”

“No, we’re not even. Because I was the one who brought your hot ass back from the nearly-dead because you’re incapable of doing stupid, reckless things that I always have to undo.”

Chat stares at her, rigid and tense. “Did… did you just call my ass ‘hot?’”

“What,” Marinette screams. “N-no! Of course not. Why-why would I even do that? It’s not like I even know what your butt looks like because I’ve never looked. That’s just weird. Anyway, I’m mad at you s-so stop trying to change the subject.”

But Chat Noir is looking at her with his stupid Cheshire Cat grin and she really, _really_ hates him. “You think my butt is sexy.”

“Whatever,” she says, pointedly not looking at him. “It’s not like you don’t already know you’re attractive. That’s why you’re always trying to flaunt your body to anyone who’ll look.”

“I didn’t realize you were one of those people looking,” he says, soft. 

“I-I’m not. But I have _eyes_.”

“Very purr-ty eyes.”

A wave of relief washes over her with his stupid cat puns. It’s just Chat Noir. She can handle this. She snaps her ‘purr-ty’ eyes to him and is surprised, and a bit smug, to see his face is as red as hers feels.

“Your puns won’t get you out of trouble, mister.”

He pouts at her. “We should keep talking about how hot you find me. I like that topic much more.”

“You’re not hot when you do stupid things.”

“I admit I could have handled that better. But I panicked and I needed to make sure you were safe. You’re the top priority, Ladybug, whether you like it or not. And can you at least admit it’s a little hypocritical that you’re mad at me but you won’t let me be mad at you?”

“Nope. Because I’m always right.”

“You’re infuriating,” he says with no heat. 

“But you love me.”

“Well, yeah.”

Her cheeks, which were just starting to cool down, flare up once again. He doesn't mean anything by it.

“There’s no Ladybug without Chat Noir,” Marinette says. “So you need to be more careful.”

“I will if you will,” he says, reaching out his hand.

“Deal,” she says, shaking on it. He takes advantage of the handshake to pull her into him. Being the awkward klutz that she is, Marinette sort of flops on top of him, pushing them both down on the bed. With her sort of straddled on top of him. Their faces close, noses almost touching. If she just leaned forward a bit…

She shoots up and starts fixing her hair to give her hands something to do.

Chat clears his throat. “Sorry. I just wanted a hug.”

Without looking at him, Marinette inches closer and wraps her arms around him. The moment he returns the hug, she lets out a long sigh. This is what she needed.

She lets her head drop onto his chest as they sit in silence for a while. Marinette has no idea what Chat is thinking or what’s keeping him occupied while they do nothing. On her part, she’s enjoying feeling the rise and fall of his chest, feeling his light breaths tickle her neck. It reminds her that he’s real and here.

She also contemplates her feelings for the blond. Before the akuma, it was easy for Marinette to ignore the signs. Now, they’re screaming at her and she can’t ignore them, no matter how hard she tries. Marinette is in love with Chat Noir. Marinette is head over heels for her pun-loving, goofball of a partner.

And she has no idea what to do about it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me on tumblr at chelseaapproved!


	8. eight.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Awkwardrien makes a comeback.

“Can you please just put me out of my misery and ask her out already,” Plagg whines. Adrien takes a second out of his brooding to glare at the kwami.

“I can’t just ask her out. She’s being weird.” With Adrien and Chat Noir, Marinette hasn’t been acting like herself. He knows she was upset the other week after the Quaker but he didn’t realize that it would affect their relationship. She gets mad at him all the time for being reckless; he didn’t think this one instance was any different. He’s still visiting her on a regular basis but their dynamic is off and Adrien is at a loss on how to fix it. The one time he tried bringing it up, Marinette turned red and stuttered about monkeys for five minutes. 

“She’s always been weird.”

“She’s being different, then.”

“Just give her some cheese, that’ll fix anything. Now, are we going or are you gonna let me sleep for once?”

“You sleep plenty. Plagg, claws out!”

Within minutes Chat lands on Mari’s balcony and he’s immediately put at ease. The promise of seeing his Lady is enough to quell any doubts. If she didn’t like him anymore, she wouldn’t keep letting him visit. Sure enough, the trapdoor is unlocked so he drops in without second thought. 

This, he realizes far too late, is a mistake. Standing in the middle of her room, talking excitedly on the phone, is Marinette. Wearing nothing but lacy red panties and a bright pink bra. 

“I’m sorry!” he shouts, clamping his eyes shut. He is never going to get that image out of his head. It has been permanently etched into his retinas. 

“Eek,” Marinette squeals, tripping over a shoe on the ground and flinging her phone. 

“I—I can leave.” 

“N-no, it’s okay. Just, let me find my phone…” 

Chat waits, fidgeting in place, while he hears Marinette scurrying around the room. 

“Sorry, Alya. I tripped and dropped my phone… no I’m okay… I should probably go anyway. I’ll see you tomorrow!” 

There’s some more shuffling and creaking before Chat feels a dip in the bed and he assumes it’s safe to open his eyes. 

“Such a gentleman,” Marinette teases. She’s flushed from her roots all the way down to her chest. He brings his eyes back up to her face, unwilling to let himself linger too long on her chest area. There is a very high chance he will not survive this night. 

He clears his throat once. Twice. Swallows and clears his throat once more. “Sorry.”

“I—I need to get better at locking the sunroof when you shouldn’t come in.”

“I certainly wasn’t expecting that…”

“I’m sorry,” she moans, hiding her face in her hands. “I was showing Alya my bra because I made it myself and I wanted to—”

“Wait. You _made_ it?” 

“Yeah,” she says, peeking her head out from her hands. 

“Marinette, that’s amazing! Can I see it?”

There’s a beat of silence. “Um…”

“I didn’t mean it like that!” Chat exclaims. Any blood that might have left his face comes rushing back at his implication. “I just… I meant, like, when it’s not on you.”

“You want me to take off my bra?”

“Yeah. Wait, no! I… You… I meant, like, when you’re not wearing it anymore. Like, at some point, when you are fully clothed and wearing a different bra?” He hangs his head in shame. 

“Oh, Kitty. I’m just teasing you. Stop before you dig yourself into a hole you can’t climb out of.”

“I think I’m already there.”

Marinette giggles. Even through his mortification, he can appreciate what a pretty sound her laugh is. She seems to be carrying herself better than him but she must be embarrassed, too. That thought grounds him and gives him strength. 

“UMS III,” he asks, hoping to get the night back on track.

“Bring it on, Chaton,” she says, flicking his bell. She clambers off the bed and toward the computer. He gives himself a second before following her down. 

“I’ll have you know I’ve been practicing. I’m totally going to cream you,” he says and is proud that it comes out like his usual voice.

“Oh yeah? Why don’t you put your money where your mouth is?”

“You want to make a bet on UMS III? That’s not fair, you’re gonna win.”

“I thought you were gonna cream me?”

Chat glares at her. He’s glad, at least, that things seem to be going back to normal. He’s Chat Noir, he shouldn’t get so flustered over _anything_. Even if that anything is the love of his life wearing nothing but underwear… no. He’s not thinking about that right now. 

“Well, I _am_ feline pretty confident,” Chat says, rubbing his chest proudly.

“Tell you what. I win, you have to do my physics homework for the next two weeks. You win, and I’ll give you a kiss—anywhere you want.”

His eyes widen. What is _up_ with her lately? She has a teasing gleam in her eyes, though, so he pushes back his flustered state and presses into her personal space.

“Anywhere,” he asks, wiggling his eyebrows. 

“Anywhere,” she confirms.

“You’re on.” 

He loses, as they both knew he would. His final score is much closer to hers than usual, though, and—he casts a sidelong glance as Marinette does her typical victory dance—he can’t help but think she went easier on him this time. Like she actually wanted to give him a chance at winning.

Nah. He’s just getting better. 

\--

Adrien tries not to get his hopes up when it comes to anything. His life has just been one disappointment after another. His birthday is no exception to that. He could count the number of birthday parties he’s had on one hand and none of them were all too enjoyable. His first birthday party only even happened because his best friend was akumatized.

Which is why he’s trying really hard not to get too excited about his plans this weekend. His friends planned a fun trip to the street fair in honor of Adrien’s upcoming birthday. The fact that Marinette was the one who came up with the idea in the first place is enough to convince him that something absolutely horrible is going to happen. He’s not that lucky.

Nino, Alya, and Marinette are already there by the time he meets them. 

“Happy birthday, dude,” Nino says, pulling Adrien into a crushing hug. 

“Not my birthday yet,” Adrien says, hugging him back, “but thanks.”

“We’re celebrating your birthday today,” Alya says as she pulls Nino off to give Adrien a hug of her own. “It totally counts.”

“Thanks, Alya.”

He turns to Marinette expectantly and remembers, all at once, Marinette in her bra and panties and his face heats up. He can’t even look her in the eyes as she stammers out ‘H-happy birthday, A-Adrien.’ 

She doesn’t offer him a hug. 

“Thanks, Marinette.” 

“Who invited _her_ ,” Alya asks with distaste. 

Adrien winces, knowing who Alya’s talking about without needing to turn around. 

“Adrikins invited me,” Chloé says, proud. She rests her elbow on his shoulder and pulls Sabrina forward. “He loves me.”

Alya glares at him. “Why would you invite them?”

“You said it was for my birthday. I wanted all my closest friends here.”

“Chloé and Sabrina are more than welcome to hang out with us today,” Marinette says. “We’re all here for Adrien, I’m sure we can call a truce for a few hours.”

“Whatever,” Chloé says. “Adrien, do you like my new shoes? Daddykins bought them for me yesterday for your birthday.”

“Your dad bought you shoes… for _my_ birthday?”

“Yep. Isn’t he the best?”

“Sure.”

The six of them spend the next hour walking around the different shops. They’re able to avoid tense situations for the most part. Adrien can tell Chloé is trying to respect Adrien’s feelings by not taking every opportunity to torment Marinette, of which he is extremely grateful. In fact, it seems like Chloé wants Adrien and Marinette to get together, if the way she keeps pushing the two of them together is any indication. But Chloé can only handle hanging out with Adrien’s friends for too long and eventually she and Sabrina break off, promising to join them later on.

“Good riddance,” Alya says as they retreat to another booth. 

“Thanks again for coming out to support me last night,” Nino says, cutting off Alya before she can start ranting. “How’d you convince your old man to let you go?”

“I didn’t. I snuck out.”

“Oh shit,” Nino exclaims. “You snuck out just for me? Thanks, man!”

“Adrien Agreste snuck out of his house?” Alya gasps. “Next thing you know, we’ll hear about Adrien knocking someone up, doing drugs in backway alleys, dropping out of school.”

“I’ve snuck out before,” Adrien protests. He sneaks out all the time, actually, but he figures it's better not to mention that.

“Oh please. I doubt you’ve ever broken a rule in your life.”

“I break rules all the time,” he says, indignant.

“Okay, sweetie.”

Adrien pouts. It’s not that he wants his friends to think he’s a delinquent but some acknowledgement that he isn’t actually the poster child his dad wants him to be would be nice. He glances at Marinette but she doesn’t appear to paying him any mind. 

“You know I break the rules sometimes, right Marinette,” he asks.

She startles and looks up at him, her blue eyes wide. “I-um. You isn’t—aren’t—no, I mean. That is to say…”

“Hey,” Alya interjects. “I have to go to the bathroom. Come with me, M?”

“Yes, please.”

Adrien sighs as he watches the two girls walk away.

“What’s up with you two, anyway,” Nino asks.

“Me and who,” Adrien asks.

“Dude.”

“Nothing is going on. You saw how she is, she won’t even talk to me.”

“Dude…”

“What?”

Nino sighs and takes his hat off his head. “How serious are you about her?”

Adrien feels his face flame up. He’s had many conversations with various people about his feelings for Marinette but they’ve always talked around it. He never actually admitted to anyone he likes her; everyone just assumes (correctly) that he does.

“I’m, uh, pretty serious,” he mumbles. 

“Like, I need specifics if I’m gonna keep up this conversation,” Nino says, peering at him over his glasses.

“I would marry her tomorrow if she’d have me,” Adrien says.

Nino’s eyes bulge before he bursts out laughing. ”You two are so ridiculous. Just ask her out, I guarantee she will say yes.”

“I can’t just ask her out! She likes someone else, she told me!”

Nino shakes his head. “She likes _you_. Trust me.”

Adrien’s heart flips in his chest. “How do you know?”

“Everyone knows. She’s had the hugest crush on you since day two.”

“What?”

Nino sighs and pulls Adrien over to an empty table near the food trucks. “I don’t know what she told you but I’m positive she’ll say yes if you ask her out.”

Adrien stares at the booth set up in front of them. It’s a bunch of teenagers selling handmade bracelets to raise money for their debate team. He watches as one of the girls pulls out some string and starts making a new one right there, rhythmically weaving the strands through each other.

“You’re sure,” he finally asks.

“As sure as my name is Nino.”

\--

Somehow, he gets stuck sitting at the table with Marinette next to him as his only company. Adrien is, like, 90% sure it’s not a coincidence. While he appreciates his friends’ encouragement, this is not a comfortable situation. Marinette is sitting quietly, drumming her fingers against the table and all he can think about is her in her underwear. Which is just… it’s inappropriate. He shouldn’t be thinking about that and even if Nino is right and she likes him he doubts she wants him thinking about her that way.

But he can’t get it out of his mind.

“So… are you having fun,” Marinette asks after a solid ten minutes of silence between the two of them.

“Yeah! Today has been fun. Thanks so much for planning this.”

“Of course,” she says, smiling shyly at him. “You deserve a nice birthday.”

“This is definitely one of the best ones I’ve ever had, thanks to you.”

She blushes and averts her eyes. “Not just me. We all helped plan it, it was just my idea but it was a team effort, really,” she babbles. 

Could all her awkward, nervous habits around him really be because she has a crush on him? It would explain why he can’t find anyone else at school she might like. And he noticed a while ago that she only acts that way around him—so it’s not a far stretch. It’s not a far stretch at all. 

Adrien reaches over to hold her fidgeting hands. “I appreciate it all the same.”

She glances at their hands and then up at his face, a beautiful blush spreading across her freckled cheeks. 

“N-no problem.”

He feels like he should say something but he doesn’t know where to go from here. If he were Chat Noir right now, he’d kiss her hands or throw out a pick-up line or make a pun. But he’s Adrien Agreste and he’s holding Marinette’s hand—Marinette who might actually reciprocate his feelings, Marinette who he saw nearly naked two nights ago—and he is at a loss for words.

Luckily, his phone buzzes and provides a welcome distraction from his thoughts. He withdraws his hands from hers and tries not to notice the way she curls her hands into fists the moment he lets go.

“It’s Alya,” he says, as though Marinette would care who’s texting him.

“What’d she say,” Marinette asks.

When Adrien opens the text, he immediately regrets letting Marinette know who texted him. His head whips up and he looks around, trying to spot Alya but he doesn’t see her anywhere.

“Nothing important,” he says, tilting the phone away from Marinette lest she see.

Alya sent him a picture of the two of them sitting at the table and captioned it _#soulmates_. She follows up with a second text saying _‘ask her out!!!!!’_ Nino—the traitor—must have told her about their conversation from earlier. 

It’s probably stupid but Adrien taps on the picture to make it bigger and his eyes are automatically drawn to Marinette’s face. Alya must have just taken it because Marinette is blushing and they’re holding hands. It’s when he focuses on his own face, though, that he get floored. 

Adrien has posed for a lot of pictures. He’s seen himself in countless magazines, billboards, posters, et cetera, et cetera. But he’s never seen himself smiling like _that_ before. Eyes twinkling with admiration, smile easy and sure. 

His heart lodges in his throat.

“They’ve been gone for a while,” Marinette says, oblivious. “Did she say when they’ll be back? I’m not surprised Chloé ditched us but I can’t believe Nino would leave for so long during your birthday party.”

“Uh. She didn’t say. I’m sure they’ll be back soon.” He closes out of the picture and sees the text again. Ask her out. He can’t, not right now. But soon. 

Definitely soon.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I really like the idea that, once she comes to terms with her crush, Marinette flirts incessantly with Chat. She already flirts with him a ridiculous amount and she's a lot closer to him than she is to Adrien so I think she'd feel more comfortable with it. 
> 
> Thank you all so much for the support this fic has gotten! You're all awesome and your comments make my day.
> 
> As always, come fangirl with me on tumblr at chelseaapproved!


	9. nine.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Oops?

Marinette is a ball of fire when she enters the school. She scans the hallway, hoping to catch one of the only other people she knows who might be as excited. The halls are fairly crowded—funny that students actually show up early to school—so it’s harder to spot him.

Then she hears Kim’s booming voice and she knows if Kim is there, Max shouldn’t be too far. She snakes through the crowd, following the deep tones of Kim’s bragging.

“Max!” Marinette exclaims. The two boys startle at Marinette’s unexpected outburst. “Did you get it?”

Max adjusts his glasses. “I assume you’re referring to the new Mega Strike 3 expansion, which was released at midnight. If that is the case, then the answer is yes. I went to the midnight release party.”

“Wait. You did? Me too!” Marinette originally wanted to go with Chat but he didn’t want to go as Chat Noir, so she wound up going with her dad instead. She can’t even bemoan the lost opportunity; she and her dad always have fun together. “Which store did you go to?”

“I went to the one approximately a block away from my house.”

“I guess that makes sense. We should have tried to coordinate something. Anyway, we should totally hang out soon to play it together!”

“That sounds like an agreeable plan. I’ll text you later with my schedule.”

“Sounds good! See you later, Max. Bye Kim.” Marinette turns around to head to her locker only to bump into a chest. A very well-defined, muscular chest and Marinette hates herself for knowing exactly whose chest it is. “S-sorry Adrien! I didn’t see you there.”

The problem, Marinette finds, with being in love with Chat Noir is that she still has strong feelings for Adrien. She never thought she’d be the type of person to be torn between two people, yet here she is.

Marinette glances behind her but Max and Kim have already departed.

“It’s ok,” he says with an easy smile. “I, uh, probably shouldn’t have gotten so close.”

Marinette smiles awkwardly at him because the only response she can think of involves a pick up line about them being much closer and she can’t bring herself to say it. If he were Chat Noir, it’d already be out of her mouth and they’d begin their battle of banter.

Adrien clears his throat. “Did I hear you talking to Max about the expansion?”

Marinette feels herself perking up. How could she have forgotten Adrien loves UMS? Playing together in her room is easily one of her favorite memories ever.

“Yes! Did you get it?”

“I preordered it so I got the download code at midnight. Didn’t have to leave my house or anything.”

Chat did the same thing. Clearly neither of them care as much about the game as she does. 

“The release parties are half the fun,” Marinette says, “but I’ll let it slide.”

They stand there smiling at each other and Marinette doesn’t even realize it’s weird until Adrien starts fidgeting.

“Have you played it yet,” he asks her.

“Of course. Papa and I played it when we got home. He told me I had to swear I’d get to school early today if we played. So here I am!”

“Here you are!” Adrien scratches the back of his neck. “It’s… pretty cool that your dad plays with you. I can’t picture my dad doing anything fun, let alone playing video games.”

“Yeah,” Marinette says, awkward. She never knows what to say when he brings up his dad. “I’m super lucky to have my parents.”

“Hey,” he says, briefly touching her shoulder. “Maybe we can hang out sometime to play it? It’ll be like old times.”

“Y-yeah! That sounds like fun. Maybe sometime next week?”

“I’m free next Thursday.”

“Perfect! So you can come over. To my room. And we can play and hang out and-and stuff?” Marinette hates how tense any interaction with Adrien makes her feel. She sometimes fumbles over her words with Chat Noir but for the most part, she feels comfortable around him; like he’s her home. And really, shouldn’t that be what love feels like? Not this jumbled mess of nerves and angst. 

But his smile is so cute, she can’t help but swoon. She needs to get her life in order.

“Sounds like a plan,” Adrien says. 

“Great!”

“Awesome.”

“Cool.” Marinette pauses. “I’m gonna go before we say more synonymous superlatives,” she says before turning heel and fleeing from him, her cheeks burning.

She can hear him calling after her to wait but she can’t bring herself to stop. She might need to reconsider Alya’s theory about Adrien liking her.

\--

The blur of the Parisian lights slow as Ladybug reaches her destination, until the buildings are happily twinkling at her. She places herself at the edge of the platform on the Eiffel Tower. A few seconds later, Chat plops himself next to her.

Ladybug immediately scoots closer to him—not close enough for them to touch but enough to feel his warmth emanating from him. She leans back on her hands, an invitation that Chat gladly accepts. He gingerly places a hand on top of hers and she can feel him relax when she doesn’t pull away.

“These are my favorite nights,” she finally says, looking out at Paris. She can feel him turn toward her but she doesn’t spare him a glance.

“Quiet ones?”

“Ones I get to patrol with just you,” she corrects.

He doesn’t say anything but she knows he’s smiling. She knows _him_ , and she hates that it took her so long to realize.

“Do you ever miss it,” she asks. “When it was just the two of us?”

“Sometimes. But I like Queen Bee and Rena Rouge. They’re a necessary part of the team.”

“Oh, I agree. We’d be toast without them, it continues getting harder to fight. I just… I don’t know. I guess I’m feeling nostalgic tonight.”

“Nothing wrong with that.” Chat squeezes her hand. “It’s definitely better for me now, knowing who you are.”

Ladybug hums in agreement. “We get to see each other more often. Even more than when it was just us two.”

“Exactly. I know how badly you miss seeing this face when I’m not around.”

“More than you can even imagine,” Ladybug says, rolling her eyes. She pulls her hand out from under his and closes the short distance between them. He slings his arm around her shoulders in response.

“I remember when you would give me hell for touching you,” Chat says.

“You’re exaggerating,” Ladybug grumbles. “I never ‘gave you hell.’”

“It was close to it. If we weren’t close because of a battle, you wanted nothing to do with me.”

“You never knew when to quit.”

“I… I was overeager. Sorry.”

Ladybug smiles at him, twisting her head uncomfortably to see his beautiful face. “It’s ok. You kind of drove me crazy back then but I still loved you.”

Chat turns his head to look at her and it brings their faces much too close. Their noses are brushing but neither make a move to separate. She’s pretty sure he wanted to say something but whatever it was gets unspoken as they stare into each other’s eyes.

Ladybug brings a shaky hand up to his face, gently tracing the edges of his mask with her fingers. Chat takes a breath and closes his eyes. She’s never wanted to know who he is as badly as she does right now. There’s no Tikki to remind her why it’s a bad idea and she doubts Chat will argue. 

Her neck gives a particularly painful twinge. She cringes as she pulls away from him. 

“Anyway,” Ladybug says, trying in vain to slow her heart. “It’s getting late, I should probably go.”

Ladybug is standing with her yoyo out and ready to go when Chat says a panicked, “wait!” 

She pauses.

“Don’t you want to stay a little longer? We never leave right after patrol.”

“I have a lot of homework left to do, Chaton.” She knows it’s a bad idea but she can’t help herself. “You can come over, if you’d like.”

Naturally, Chat jumps on the chance. 

\--

“Hey Marinette, can I talk to you for a second?”

Marinette closes her locker and looks up into the gorgeous, green eyes of Adrien Agreste. Never in her life did Marinette think she’d be the kind of person to have a type but she was clearly very wrong. She definitely has a type. 

“What’s up, Adrien?”

“I know we were planning on hanging out tomorrow but I have to cancel.” He rubs the back of his neck awkwardly. It’s a nervous tic she noticed both Adrien and Chat have.

“Oh.” Marinette tries not to let her disappointment show but she doesn’t think she’s doing a good job. She was really looking forward to spending time with him. “That’s okay, I understand.”

“I’m really sorry. I was so excited to hang out with you, you have no idea.”

“It’s fine. I know your schedule is always packed.”

“Yeah…” he says, blushing.

“What is it?”

“I, uh, didn’t do so well on the algebra test so Père is kind of grounding me until I can get my grades back up.”

Marinette gasps dramatically, clutching her heart. “Are you telling me the perfect Adrien Agreste actually has… flaws?” She regrets it immediately, remembering how defensive he can get about these kinds of things but she hopes he knows she’s kidding.

“Shut up,” Adrien says, bumping shoulders with hers. “I’ve been known to mess up once every 8 years. I was due.”

Marinette grins up at him. He looks so cute with pink cheeks. “Seriously, though, I understand. I’m sorry you’re grounded though.”

Adrien shrugs. “Story of my life.”

“If you need any help studying... actually. I was going to say you could always ask me but I don’t think I would be much help. Sorry.”

Adrien laughs. “It’s fine. I’m just disappointed we can’t hang out now. I like spending time with you.”

That certainly gets a response out of Marinette. Her cheeks flame up and she has to look away for fear of doing something stupid. “I-I like spending time with you, too,” she mutters.

“I don’t know why you’d want to waste your time with me,” Adrien says.

“I love spending time with you, Adrien,” Marinette insists, looking back up at him. Adrien is too self-deprecating for his own good. “You’re so sweet and smart and talented. You’re a wonderful person and a great friend.”

Adrien is quiet and Marinette worries that she went too far. He’s going to think she’s just a creepy fangirl and want nothing to do with her and she’s going to have to leave the country.

And then Adrien’s lips are on hers. It takes a second for Marinette to make sure that no, she’s not dreaming and yes, that is Adrien kissing her. Then she melts into him, letting out an embarrassing moan as she wraps her arms around his neck.

He grabs onto her hips and gently guides her to the lockers where he presses against her. Her mind is spinning and nothing is getting through to her except Adrien, Adrien, Adrien. He brushes his tongue against her lips and she eagerly opens her mouth so she can taste him. She runs her fingers through his hair, ready to play with his cat ears but she just grabs fistfulls of hair.

She rips away from him with a gasp, pushing him back so she can get out from his arms.

“Sorry, did I do something wrong,” Adrien asks. He looks so concerned, like he genuinely thinks he did something to hurt her and she hates herself.

With tears stinging her eyes she blurts out, “I am so sorry Adrien but I can’t do this. I like someone else.” She’s down the hall before he can get another word in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come fangirl with me on tumblr at chelseaapproved!


	10. ten.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was originally too short and I didn't feel comfortable presenting to you what is essentially half a chapter. So I wound up combining this with what I was going to make chapter 11. I think it makes it a more satisfying read but that also means there's a POV change partway through. And now you get a nice long chapter, instead.

_I like someone else_. The words ring in his head in the world’s worst symphony. _I like someone else_.

He doesn’t know how he ever tricked himself into thinking he was the boy Marinette has a crush on. She is the most incredible person to ever exist and he’s just her awkward friend who smells like cheese. She’s also the kindest person he’s ever met; obviously she was going to compliment him to make him feel better. It didn’t mean anything.

“You can share some of my camembert,” Plagg offers, flying over to Adrien.

“I don’t want any of your stinky cheese,” Adrien says, embarrassed when his voice breaks. He’s not going to cry over a girl. He isn’t that bad.

“Who needs girls anyway? They’re too much trouble.”

“I know you’re just trying to help, and I appreciate that, but I’d like to be left alone for a little while. If you don’t mind.”

Plagg flies off, presumably into his preferred garbage can, and Adrien is left with his thoughts.

He tries to figure out where it all went so wrong. As far as Marinette’s crush goes, he considered himself a definite possibility for a while now but she kept giving him mixed signals about her feelings. 

And then Nino and Alya happened…

He really thought that Marinette’s best friend would know who she likes. Isn’t that the point of best friends--to tell all your secrets to? If that’s the case, then what in the world made Alya think he had any chance? Although, Chat Noir is also one of Mari’s best friends and she refused to use any names when talking about her crush with him. It’s possible she did the same with Alya. 

Adrien groans and smothers his face with his pillow. 

He can’t even wallow in self-pity properly because even stronger than his heartache is his shame. What must Marinette think of him, forcing himself on her like that? He thought she was reciprocating but maybe he was reading the whole thing wrong. He clearly can’t trust his instincts. And now he’s gone and assaulted the girl of his dreams, all because he’s an idiot who still doesn’t know how to pick up on social cues.

The obnoxious techno song Nino mixed a couple weeks ago blasts through the silence of the room, forcing Adrien out of his thoughts. He almost ignores it but picks up his phone at the last second, figuring a talk with Nino could help him keep his mind off of Marinette.

“Hello?”

“Dude! I couldn’t find you after school. Where’d you go?”

“Sorry. I was talking to Marinette and then I needed to get home.”

“Ooh, what were you two talking about?”

Adrien sighs. “I told her that my father grounded me so I can’t hang out with her tomorrow.”

“What? When did this happen?”

“This morning.”

“You should have told me! We need to come up with a new plan then.”

He knew he shouldn’t have answered Nino. Adrien really does not want to talk about Marinette.

“I don’t think a new plan is necessary,” Adrien says. “But thanks for all your help. I guess it just wasn’t meant to be.”

“No way! You can’t give up just because your old man has a stick up his ass. Listen, as soon as you’re not grounded ask Marinette out. And actually ask her out this time; don’t chicken out and only call it ‘hanging out.’ Let her know you want to go on a date.”

“Listen, Nino, I really appreciate all the help you gave me coming up with a plan to ask out Marinette but I don’t want to make a new one. I don’t think she’ll say yes and it’s not worth all the trouble.”

“I thought we already established that Marinette is crazy about you,” Nino says. “Stop being so hard on yourself, man.”

Adrien can’t bring himself to tell Nino what happened. He knows it’ll have to happen eventually but the pain is still so raw, Adrien doesn’t trust himself to talk about it yet. 

“I don’t want to talk about this right now,” Adrien says. 

“Dude, I’m serious. You have nothing to worry about, she—” 

“Nino I really don’t want to talk about it.”

“Okay.” There’s an awkward pause and Adrien feels bad for being so short with his friend but not bad enough to do anything about it. “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” Adrien lies. 

“You don’t sound fine.”

“I’m tired and frustrated. Don’t mind me. How are you doing? I feel like we’ve only talked about Marinette this past week.”

“That might be true,” Nino says. “I’m good. I found this new song yesterday that has so many different layers, I can’t wait to dig my hands into it and use it in a bunch of new mixes.”

Adrien heads over to his computer, balancing his phone between his ear and shoulder while he signs in. “What’s it called? I want to listen to it.”

They spend another half hour talking about Nino’s music before Nino’s mom calls him away. As soon as they hang up, Adrien puts his phone back in his pocket and is left with an empty pit at the bottom of his stomach. It was nice talking to Nino but now that it’s over, he’s stuck staring at his computer’s background, which is a picture of Ladybug.

He’s kind of an idiot.

Adrien walks over to his bed and flomps onto it. He’s stuck in the endless thought spiral, unable to pull himself out. 

“Do you think I ever had a shot,” Adrien asks. He knows Plagg’s listening, waiting for when Adrien wants him.

“I think Ladybug’s an idiot if she doesn’t see how great you are.”

It is, hands down, the nicest thing Plagg has ever said to him. Adrien almost wants to take out his phone and ask Plagg to repeat it so he can record it. He doesn’t agree with Plagg at all but he’s glad he has such an awesome companion.

“She’s not an idiot. Don’t call her that.”

“I’m just saying. By human standards you’re sexy—you’re a model. She’s already acknowledged things she likes about you. I don’t get it.”

“That’s not how love works. Plenty of people are awesome. I think Alya is awesome and beautiful but I don’t want to date her.”

“Well, Ladybug should want to date you.”

Adrien groans. “She’s probably expecting me to visit her tonight, too.”

“Don’t go.”

“You never want me to go.”

“And now we know I was right all along.”

It’s tempting. He could just phone her as Chat and quickly say he’s busy and she’ll never have to know. Plus, he feels like he’s lying if he shows up. He practically assaulted her, she won’t want to be anywhere near Adrien. Even if she doesn’t know it’s Adrien, he should respect that.

On the other hand, he always makes it a point to visit her when he notices she’s having a bad day. He brought her to tears earlier, the least he could do is try to comfort her. Adrien nods to himself. He’ll visit her tonight, cheer her up, do whatever it takes to make her feel better, and then he’ll keep his distance.

“We’re going, aren’t we,” Plagg asks. “I can see it on your face.”

“Just for tonight,” Adrien responds. “I need to make sure she’s okay.”

“And who’s going to make sure _you’re_ okay?”

“I can handle myself, Plagg. I’m a big boy.”

“Says the kid who was crying before.”

“I wasn’t crying!”

“Sure, keep telling yourself that.”

“You know what? I don’t need this. Plagg, claws out!”

~~**~~**~~**~~**~~

Chat Noir visits too soon. Marinette hasn’t had time to calm down or figure out what she’s going to say. But there he is, wringing his hands nervously on her bed. As though he somehow knows what’s about to happen.

“Are you alright,” she asks. “You seem a bit… off.”

“What? I’m fine! You’re the one acting strangely.”

Marinette can’t even argue, she is acting strangely. It’s entirely plausible that he picked up on her nerves the moment he dropped into her room. She takes a deep breath and tries to sort out her thoughts. It doesn’t work and she groans, frustrated with herself for being in this situation in the first place. 

“Really, Mari,” he says, gentle. “Is everything okay? Did something happen?”

“Adrien kissed me,” Marinette shouts. She claps her hands to her mouth but it’s far too late. Chat winces, making Marinette feel guilty. There were so many better ways to handle this conversation…

“Oh. Uh, was it… Um. Are you okay?”

Marinette squeezes her eyes shut and gathers all her courage. She’s going to get everything out, even if she can’t look at him while she does it.

“I’ve had a crush on him for so long,” she starts. “Ever since he gave me his umbrella. Like, I could barely get two sentences out in front of him because my mind would just shut down completely and I would act like such a fool and for a while I thought he must think I’m a lunatic or something but the past few months have been so wonderful because we’ve been talking more, or he’s been talking to me, and we’ve gotten closer as friends and it was perfect. And then you got hurt and everything changed and I was so confused and I didn’t know what I should do so I was sort of ignoring it but then Adrien kissed me and at first it was nice. Like, really nice. _Really_ nice. But then I realized—”

“Wait,” Chat finally interjects. Marinette peeks up at him. His face is the reddest she’s ever witnessed and his eyes are blown wide. “The boy you have a crush on is Adrien Agreste?”

“Yes, but—”

“The model?”

“Yeah but that’s not—”

“You’ve had a crush on Adrien Agreste, the supermodel, this entire time?”

“Oh my gosh, _yes_ , but if you’d let me finish, I wanted to tell you that while he was kissing me I realized that I would rather be kissing you.”

Silence falls over the two teens as Marinette lets the words wash over them. Her heart is pounding incredibly fast and she feels sick to her stomach.

“So… you rejected Adrien, the model, the boy you’ve liked for years… for me?”

“Yes.” Marinette is quite confident her face is just as red as Chat’s at this point.

And then he starts laughing. At first, Marinette is offended that he’s laughing at her but she realizes it’s the type of laugh filled with unbridled joy. The kind you can’t control, even if you try your hardest, because you’re so incandescently happy it bursts out of you. She joins in with him, naturally, letting the relief and joy at his reaction take over. They somehow end with their arms wrapped around the other, their foreheads pressing together.

“I’d very much like to kiss you,” Chat says.

Marinette doesn’t even hesitate as she presses her lips against his. It isn’t nearly as passionate as the kiss she shared with Adrien. In fact, it’s pretty awkward. Neither of them can stop smiling so there’s too much teeth for it to work properly.

“Sorry.” Chat burrows his face in her neck, sending a chill down her spine. “When I calm down, can we try again?”

Marinette lets her hand drift to the back of his head, running her fingers through his hair and scratching behind his cat ears.

“We can keep trying as many times as we need to,” Marinette says, breathless. It seems unreal, how happy they both are.

He squeezes her. “You really want to kiss me?”

“So much,” she assures him. “I love you, Chat. I’m sorry it took me so long to get here but I really do love you so much.”

“Ladybug.” His breath tickles her neck and it takes all her willpower not to kiss him again. “Can I show you who I am now? I—I need…”

“Chat, we already talked about this.”

“I feel like I’m lying to you, by not revealing myself.”

“I don’t care who you are under the mask, Chaton. I’ll always adore you, no matter what.”

“Tikki.” Chat lifts his head, putting too much distance between them. Marinette’s hands fall to Chat’s shoulders. “You know who I am, right?”

“You do?” Marinette exclaims.

The red kwami flies over to them. “Uh…”

“I know you must. Plagg told me he knew it was Marinette when I first found out,” Chat says.

Tikki casts a guilty look at Marinette before nodding. “I know who you are.”

“How?” Marinette says in disbelief. “You’ve known this whole time and didn’t tell me! That’s not fair.”

“It’s for the best, Marinette. No one is supposed to know who you really are.” Tikki turns to Chat Noir. “I know the predicament you’re in but you still can’t let her know.”

“But surely you can make an exception,” Chat protests.

“I’m sorry but it’s safer this way.”

“But—” 

“No,” Tikki says with finality. “I understand why you want to tell Marinette but it’s safer for everyone if you keep it secret. I’m sorry, Chat Noir.”

Chat’s ears droop and he curls back into Marinette, who definitely doesn’t object. She resumes petting Chat’s hair, which is honestly the most amazing and perfect hair she’s ever felt. Not that she’s touched a lot of people’s hair but still. 

“I still think it’d be better if you knew,” he says into Marinette’s neck. 

“You have no idea how curious I am,” Marinette says. “But it’s probably better to listen to an ancient kwami than our hormones.” 

Chat tries to snuggle even closer to Marinette but they’re already as close as they can be. “It’s not just hormones, M’Lady. I’ve been in love with you since Stoneheart.”

Marinette freezes. She has to blink away the stinging in her eyes. So that’s what it feels like to have your soulmate confess their love to you. She can barely breathe.

“Chat,” she breathes.

He pulls away, just enough to look at her. His eyes are shining with love--so much love--and Marinette loses all her control. She launches forward, not caring if their teeth clash. Thankfully, their kiss is much smoother than their last and Marinette is able to appreciate the feel of his soft lips and smell of Adrien’s skin.

Marinette rips herself away from him. 

No. Nonononono. This cannot be happening. She thought her kiss with Adrien proved that she’d rather be kissing Chat Noir; she can’t be thinking about Adrien while kissing Chat as well. 

“Is everything okay,” Chat asks. 

It’s Marinette’s turn to hide herself in her partner’s neck. She takes a deep breath, inhaling Chat’s scent, and nods. He...he does smell a bit like Adrien. She’s not really good at identifying scents and if she were blindfolded, she probably wouldn’t be able to tell the difference between the two boys. Plus, she had just kissed Adrien a few hours ago. Her mind was confused about which boy she was kissing. That’s all. 

“I love you so much, Marinette,” Chat whispers, stroking her hair. Marinette closes her eyes and gets lost in the feeling. She definitely chose the right person. 

“I love you too, Chat,” she says and smirks when he shivers. “I’ve never met anyone as incredible as you.”

“Marinette, I love you but you’re crazy. You’re the most amazing person in the whole entire world. I’m having a hard time believing that this is even happening right now.”  
Marinette giggles. “I am too. It feels like a dream.”

“There’s no way this is a dream,” Chat says. “Not even my dreams are this happy.”

“Chat!” Marinette feels herself blushing. She can’t believe she never knew how sappy her partner is. 

“It’s true. Today has been a rollercoaster of a day.”

“Why? What happened earlier?”

“It’s not important anymore. You made everything better.”

“Seriously, you need to stop.”

Chat chuckles and leans away from her so he can see her face, which she imagines is bright red. “Aw, am I making you blush, Bugaboo?”

“Don’t call me Bugaboo,” Marinette grumbles but there’s no hope to salvage what’s already been done. Chat Noir is never going to stop teasing her.

“I thought boyfriends were allowed to call their girlfriends pet names.”

Marinette’s heart flutters at the mention of boyfriends and girlfriends. “Only if the girlfriend agrees to the pet name. Also, who said you were my boyfriend?”

Chat stiffens. “I assumed… since we both love each other. I mean, you don’t have to…”

Marinette grinned, glad that she got the upper hand back. “Well,” she says, drawing out the word. “I guess, if you really want to, we can be boyfriend and girlfriend.”

“Oh, you guess?”

“It’ll be quite the burden,” she says, removing her arm from his person so she can dramatically place the back of her hand on her forehead. “But I think I’ll make it through.”

“Wow,” Chat says, failing to fight back a grin. “You know, if dating me is going to be that difficult for you we can just forget the whole thing. I’ll just find another girl to fall in love with.”

Marinette glares at him. “You do that and I will skin you alive.”

“Possessive Ladybug,” Chat says, wiggling his eyebrows.

“You better believe it.” Marinette pulls Chat into her chest and hugs his head. “Mine. No one else can have you.”

“Marinette,” he says, voice slightly muffled. “Much as I love this position, I thought we’d date more before getting to second base.”

Marinette looks down, baffled, before realizing that she essentially shoved Chat’s face into her boobs. She fights back the urge to scream and run away in mortification.

“I don’t know," she says, trying to play it cool, "I kind of like this position.”

“Yeah? I think it’d be better without your top.”

“Alright,” she says, pushing him away. “Down kitty.”

“Hey.” Chat raises his hands in surrender. “You’re the one who decided my face should get the best view in the house.”

“Shut up,” she laughs. 

“So, uh,” Chat says, sobering quickly. “Joking aside, are we dating now?”

Marinette grins at him. “I’d like that.”

“Good,” he breathes. “Me too.”


	11. eleven.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some chats are to be had.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year! Have a happy Adrien.

Adrien wakes to the sound of birds singing and the sun gently filtering in through his windows. He rolls over to check his clock and finds that he beat his alarm by five minutes. Most mornings he would close his eyes and wait until the blaring forces him into action. Today isn’t most mornings, though, so he disables the alarm and hops out of bed. 

Plagg’s still sleeping, if the snoring coming from his couch is any indication, so Adrien quietly slips into the bathroom to get started on his day. 

A singer Adrien is not, but that doesn’t stop him from singing at the top of his lungs while he washes his hair in the shower. He usually doesn’t sing so loudly--and certainly doesn’t sing the types of songs he’s currently belting--but today he doesn’t care who hears him. 

“Oh, you’re alive,” Plagg asks the moment Adrien re-enters his room.

“Yes?”

“I thought you were dying, with all the strange noises you were making. You woke me up for no reason, then.”

“Sorry for the inconvenience,” Adrien says with no heat. “How about some Camembert to make up for it?”

Plagg perks up immediately and flies over to Adrien with a huge smile on his face. “Mmmm Camembert. Yes, please!”

“Alright, when I’m done with breakfast I’ll sneak you some extra cheese.”

“I wish you got together with Ladybug years ago if this is your attitude,” Plagg says.

Adrien can’t fight the dopey grin that crosses his face. “Me too.”

His good mood lasts all morning. Not even Nathalie and her strict schedule can bring him down.

“Are you alright,” she asks once she finishes the day’s agenda. Concern flits across her face for a second before she schools it back to her normal emotionless state.

“I’m great, thanks for asking,” Adrien answers, taking another big biteful of his cereal. “How are you doing?” 

“I’m...good.” She pauses, as though debating whether she wants to say what’s on her mind or not. “Are you high?”

Adrien sighs. “High on life. High on love.”

Nathalie lifts one perfectly sculpted brow. “Is there anything you’d like to share, Adrien?”

“Nope,” he says, finishing off the last of his cereal. “Anyway, I have to go--got a long day ahead of me. See you later!” Adrien rushes off to the kitchen to swipe some Camembert for Plagg before heading up to his room.

“Time to go, Plagg.” Adrien sprays a few more pumps of cologne to make sure he’s properly covered the cheesy scent and grabs his backpack. He almost makes it to the door without checking but he caves and winds up looking at himself in the mirror. Again. He looks exactly as he did the last time he checked but he needed to make sure.

Content with his smell and his appearance, Adrien lets Plagg fly into his outer shirt pocket and they travel to school together. 

It’s not until Adrien gets to class and makes eye contact with a flustered Marinette that Adrien remembers a very important fact that he’s been all but ignoring. Marinette rejected Adrien yesterday. His face heats up and he sheepishly makes his way to desk, figuring it’d be even more embarrassing if he fled the room altogether. 

He should probably talk to her. That was his original plan last night until he visited her and everything changed. The problem is, he has no idea what to say. Adrien isn’t supposed to know that she has a giant crush on him. He definitely isn’t supposed to know that she’s dating Chat Noir. And _she_ doesn’t know that he is actually Chat Noir and she fell in love with him twice and they’re dating and in love and… 

He really doesn’t know what he should say. 

“A-Adrien?” comes a timid voice from behind him. 

Well.

Bracing himself, Adrien turns to her. The blue of her blouse brings out her eyes. “Good morning, Marinette.”

“Would we be able to talk later? Alone?”

“Sure,” he says, grateful that he’ll at least have a little time to think of how he should be acting around her. “Lunch?”

“Yeah. A friendly lunch. Between two friends.”

Adrien needs to bite back a smile. He isn’t supposed to be as happy as he is. “Don’t worry, Marinette. I know it’s not a date.”

Her (very, very blue) eyes widen. “I-I’m sorry! I didn’t mean it like that! I mean, I did but I don’t--”

“Marinette,” he says, reaching out a hand before he even knows what he’s doing. Her hands are so soft. It’s not something he gets to properly appreciate as Chat Noir. “It’s okay. I understand.”

She frowns and looks down. “This is why I want to talk to you.”

“I know. We’ll talk during lunch.”

He smiles at her and from the way she blushes and pulls her hand out from under his, Adrien has a feeling he isn’t able to keep the softness out of it. 

\--

Marinette brings him to her house and they wait until they’re alone in the kitchen before looking at each other. 

“I’m sorry,” he says first. Because even though he knows she likes him, it still wasn’t okay to kiss her without permission.

“No! I’m sorry. Really sorry. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

“I should have asked you before just kissing you. You know what they say when you assume…”

“I have a boyfriend,” she blurts out. 

Hearing the girl you like tell you she has a boyfriend shouldn’t put a smile on your face but Adrien can’t help himself. She’s talking about _him_. 

“Oh,” he says.

“It’s new and we’re not really telling anyone right now but I just wanted you to know it’s nothing personal. If it weren’t for him… That’s probably not very comforting, is it? Oh my god, I’m sorry.”

If it weren’t him, if her boyfriend were some other random unknown person, Adrien would probably be on the brink of tears right now. As it were, he is once again in the uncomfortable position of desperately wanting to smile.

“It’s okay, really. You don’t have to apologize for anything.”

“I want to make sure we’re okay and we can still be friends.”

“Yes! I definitely want to be friends,” Adrien says. 

“Really? You don’t hate me?”

“How could I ever hate you?”

“I--I rejected you,” Marinette says.

Adrien shrugs. “I just want to be able to spend time with you. I’ll take you however I can.”

“You’re being very… kind about this,” she says with a frown. “I don’t think I’d be able to handle this so calmly if the situation were reversed.”

He could just tell her right now. She wouldn’t have to feel guilty. There would be no need for any lingering awkwardness. He’d be able to kiss her whenever he pleases and the entire world would know Marinette Dupain-Cheng is off-limits. 

But apparently her kwami’s just as stubborn as she is so he keeps his mouth shut.

“You don’t give yourself enough credit,” he settles on saying. “Being your friend is more than enough.”

“Thank you,” she says, blushing. They spend the next few minutes eating in silence. He has no idea what she must be thinking but on his part, he still doesn’t know how to interact with her like this. If she just _knew_ , she wouldn’t expect him to keep it quiet. Then again, if she knew they wouldn’t be in this predicament in the first place.

Frustrated, Adrien grabs another pastry and tears into it. 

“So… tell me about your boyfriend,” he says, finally breaking the silence. He feels Plagg moving in his pocket, knows the kwami is mocking him, but can anyone really blame him? Adrien’s been handed a golden opportunity and he is just enough a piece of shit to take it.

Marinette looks up at him like a deer in headlights. “Y-you want to know about my boyfriend? Are you sure?”

“Yeah. We said we’ll stay friends, right? That’s what friends talk about.”

She tilts her head in confusion, no doubt trying in vain to figure out what is running through his mind. “He’s my best friend,” is all she says and it hits him so hard he has to look away.

“I thought Alya was your best friend.”

“She is! But he is too and he’s just so… so _him_.”

Adrien blinks. He has no idea what to make of that but she sounds fond so he hopes it’s a good thing.

Marinette lets out a huff of breath before continuing. “He’s stubborn and rash and overprotective. He has the worst sense of humor in any person I’ve ever met. He’s always there bothering me and pestering me but when he isn’t around I miss him like the idiot that I am. He always makes really dumb, reckless decisions and gives me a heart attack at least once a week because of them. 

“He’s incredibly sweet and thoughtful. He’s brave and charming and brilliant. My life is better because of him and my day is brighter when he’s there. He also knows how to pull off a leather suit better than anyone else.”

It looks like Marinette could keep going but Adrien can’t take it anymore. He excuses himself and rushes off to the bathroom.

As soon as he locks the door, Plagg flies out of his pocket, cackling at him. 

“Shut up,” Adrien says, splashing water on his burning face. He knew Marinette loved him--she told him last night as much--but to hear her talk so adoringly about him… It’s too much.

“You okay, loverboy?”

“She really loves me,” he says, voice weak and faint. Adrien puts down the lid so he can sit on the toilet to breathe for a minute. He needs to get a grip so he doesn’t do something stupid, like kiss her again.

“Yep. And you’re lying to her everyday.”

“Plagg,” he hisses. “I’m not lying to her on purpose! She doesn’t want to know who I am. You even told me I shouldn’t tell her!”

“Sure, keep telling yourself that.”

Adrien glares at him. He’s not lying to his girlfriend, he’s just willfully omitting important information at her own request. When Marinette eventually finds out his identity they’ll be able to laugh at all this. 

He hopes.

\--

Chat isn’t exactly sure what he expected when Ladybug called to tell him she was hosting a team meeting on the Eiffel Tower, but it definitely wasn’t making out with his new girlfriend while they waited for the others. He’s pretty sure that’s not what Ladybug intended either, but here they are.

“M-M’Lady,” he says, breaking away from her warm embrace. “They can be here any second.”

“I asked you to come early so we could talk,” she says before pulling him back to her.

He’s weak to resist her, and it’s hard to say no when all he ever wants is to kiss her so he indulges himself for a bit before finding the willpower to pull away once again.

“This isn’t really talking.”

“Well, no, you’re right. I got carried away.” Ladybug removes herself from his personal bubble and the whole world feels a little colder. She primly folds her hands and places them in her lap. “I was thinking and--”

“Now you’re too far away,” Chat whines, leaning over to pull her closer.

“Chat! I can’t control myself when you’re this close,” she says, bopping him on the nose before moving away again. 

“I can’t control myself when you say things like that,” he groans.

She giggles, like the adorable being that she is, before taking a deep breath and composing herself. “Okay. We can do this,” she says, more to herself than to him.

“Speak for yourself.”

“I was thinking,” she says, ignoring him, “and I think we should tell Rena and Bee.”

“Why?”

“Saving Paris comes first. It’s our responsibility to keep our teammates informed when we do something that will affect our performance.”

“You think dating will make us fight worse?”

“No. I mean, it’s possible, but no. I’m just concerned, if something happens, I know I’ll make stupid decisions where you’re concerned and it’s… it’s just safer if they know.”

Chat watches in amusement as Ladybug gets flustered over nothing. 

“I’ll feel less guilty if they know.”

“Why do you feel guilty?”

“I don’t know! I just do! Please, Chat?” Ladybug leans into him, fluttering her eyelashes at him. “For me?”

“How can I resist,” he says flatly. She grins at him and pecks him quickly. 

“You’re the best.”

“So, how much longer until they’re supposed to come?”

“Maybe ten minutes, why?”

Chat grins. If they’re going to find out anyway, he can think of something he’d much rather be doing while they wait. 

Which is how Rena Rouge and Queen Bee find them.

“Ugh, no one wants to see that,” Bee says, placing herself next to Chat. Ladybug hides herself in Chat’s shoulder and he can feel her embarrassment radiating from her. 

“I knew they were together,” Rena squeals. “You owe me 10 euros!”

“Wait, what,” Ladybug says, peeking out from hiding spot. 

“We had a bet going on whether your two were dating,” Rena explains, sitting next to Bee and swinging an arm around her shoulder. “I knew you were but she thought you weren’t, for some reason.”

“Chat was whining about his supposed unrequited love a few weeks ago! This is definitely a new development.” Bee glares at Chat and Ladybug, as though it’s their fault she lost the bet. It kind of is, but they shouldn’t have been gambling on his love life in the first place.

“I called you guys here to tell you about us,” Ladybug says. “We just got together last night.”

“Last night? What took you so long,” Rena asks.

“Blame her,” Chat says, pointing a thumb at his pretty, blushing girlfriend. “I would have dated her years ago if she let me but no she had to like another guy this whole time.”

“Oh my _gosh_ , Chat, don’t bring him up,” Ladybug says. 

“Am I wrong?”

“No but leave him out of this.” Ladybug straightens. “It’s true that I...took a while to catch on but that’s irrelevant. What matters is that Chat Noir and I are dating and I wanted you two to know.”

“What about Marinette,” Rena asks. Chat and Ladybug both freeze.

“What about her,” he asks slowly.

“I hope you haven’t been leading her on.”

“Marinette Dupain-Cheng?” Queen Bee demands. “What in the world does she have to do with Ladynoir finally getting together?”

Chat is so preoccupied with that ‘Ladynoir’ comment that he almost misses Rena’s outburst. “He calls her Princess and visits her at night!”

There’s a tense silence between the four heroes. Ladybug is probably, much like himself, panicking and trying to come up with something to say. 

“How do you know he visits her,” Ladybug asks.

“I...I saw him. Once.”

Chat glances at Ladybug but he knows there’s only so much she can do as Ladybug and not Marinette. “I like their cookies,” he shrugs.

“I’ve visited her for the cookies before too,” Ladybug lies. “Her parents are very good bakers.”

“And you’re okay with your boyfriend flirting with another girl?”

“Marinette knows how I feel about Ladybug,” Chat says quickly. “She knows how helplessly in love I am and that I am completely devoted to My Lady. There is no leading anyone on happening.”

“Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Queen Bee repeats in disbelief. They collectively ignore her.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for taking so long to update. My job is slowly sucking the life out of me. I don't have time to do any of the things I used to enjoy, like write. There aren't that many chapters left so I'm hoping to finish this up soon. Thanks for your patience and for reading!


	12. twelve.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some things just aren't meant to be kept secret.

Marinette wakes to 12 unread texts from Alya. She’s kind of useless in the morning but the threat of something happening to her friend has Marinette on alert. She quickly sits up, ignoring the wave of dizziness it causes and unlocks her phone.

**Alya: MArinette!!!**

**!!!!!**

**Did you see?????**

**Ans wer meee**

**Theyre dating o.0**

**Go on**

**Ladyblog**

**So many ppl sent me pics of them making out**

**Like they were srsly going at it on the eiffel tower**

**Newscasters want to interview me cuz i was the one to break the scoop!!!!**

**THEYRE DATING ASDLHSDFAD**

**OMG just wake up and answer me already**

Marinette stares at her phone in horror. With shaky hands, she goes on the Ladyblog on her phone and sees it, right on the homepage. The picture is a little blurry, but it is unmistakably a zoomed in picture of Ladybug and Chat Noir in a very...compromising position.

Apparently making out at the top of the Eiffel Tower is not a good idea if you’re a famous superhero and want to keep your relationship a secret.

“Tikki,” Marinette yelps, “what do I do?”

Tikki flies over to her and peers at the picture on the screen. Instead of providing any ancient and wise godly advice, Tikki giggles. “Aww, you two are so cute!”

“So not the point!”

“There’s nothing you can do about it now, Marinette. Maybe learn to have a bit more self-control next time.”

Marinette groans, her face growing hot, and locks her phone. Since she’s already awake, she starts getting ready for school, determined not to think about her public humiliation.

“You’re up early,” her mom says when Marinette stumbles into the kitchen 15 minutes later.

“Alya woke me up,” Marinette responds. She still hasn’t answered and has 3 more texts from the girl. She’ll deal with it at school.

Her mom heads to the cabinet to get a bowl while Marinette gets the milk from the fridge. “Is everything okay?”

“She’s fine,” Marinette says as she pours her cereal. “Chat Noir and Ladybug are officially a couple so Ayla’s freaking out.”

“I always figured they were dating,” her mom says, which is just so not what she wants to hear right now.

“Why does everyone keep saying that?”

“What? They make a cute pair.”

Marinette feels her face heat up. “Well, yeah but I’m sure they want their privacy. I wouldn’t want my love life broadcasted for all of Paris to see.”

“That’s true.”

“And how did anyone even see them in the first place? They were so high up!”

“Oh, you know how it is with celebrities, dear. They can never catch a break.”

“But they’re not celebrities, they’re superheroes!”

“I’m sure they’d appreciate that thought but most people don’t share that sentiment, unfortunately,” her mom says, patting Marinette’s shoulder. “Now, I need to get down to the bakery. Have a good day, sweetie.”

“You too, Maman.”

Her mom kisses her forehead before heading down. Marinette finishes her breakfast deep in thought. On the one hand, she’s still not happy that the whole world knows she’s dating Chat Noir. On the other hand, hearing her mom speak approvingly of her relationship was nice. Just thinking about it brings a much-needed warmth to her chest.

There’s no point in wasting any more time so Marinette braces herself before heading out to school, ready to face Alya. 

Naturally, Alya pounces on Marinette as soon as she enters the room. “Girl, you need to answer your phone.”

“I was sleeping and then getting ready.”

“Did you at least read my texts? Did you see?”

“That Chat Noir and Ladybug are dating? Yeah, I saw.”

“I am so rubbing this in Chloé’s face,” Alya gloats. Marinette rolls her eyes but can’t help the small smile that forms on her lips.

“Morning ladies,” Nino says as he and Adrien take their seats. Marinette smiles at them and looks away. She wonders if she’ll ever feel comfortable around Adrien Agreste. 

“Morning!” Alya says. “Did you guys hear the news?”

“No, what happened?”

“Chat Noir and Ladybug are the hottest couple in Paris.”

“Wait, what,” Adrien asks, whipping around in his seat. “What do you mean?”

“Chat Noir and Ladybug were caught kissing on the Eiffel Tower. It’s all over the Ladyblog and I’m going for an interview on Nadja Chamack’s channel this Thursday to discuss it!”

Adrien catches Marinette’s eye, blushes, and looks away, leaving Marinette flustered and confused. “Oh. I didn’t realize… I didn’t look at the blog this morning.”

“Check it out when you have the chance! It’s so perfect.” Alya turns to Marinette and her face falls. “Hey, I know I’ve been freaking out about this but are you okay?”

“Yes?” Marinette tilts her head in confusion, unsure why she would even ask. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“I know you and Chat Noir were… something.”

“Oh my gosh,” Marinette exclaims, hiding her heated face behind her hands. She can feel Adrien’s eyes on her and her face burns hotter. He must think she has such a fickle heart. “How many times do I have to tell you there is no scandalous relationship between us?”

“Marinette, that boy is, like, obsessed with you. Or something.”

“Definitely or something,” Marinette says. “There’s nothing there. He loves Ladybug and I like…someone else.”

It feels wrong using her crush on Adrien to defend her lack of relationship with Chat Noir, but she doesn’t know what else to do. She hates lying, especially to her best friend but she can’t exactly admit that she’s dating Chat. She just hopes Alya never finds out she rejected Adrien.

“You’re sure you’re not upset? You don’t seem very happy about the news.”

“I’m just tired. _Someone_ kept texting me this morning and it woke me up.”

“As long as you’re sure. I could kick Chat Noir’s butt if he hurt you.”

“Trust me,” Marinette says, glad she can at least be honest about this. “I couldn’t be happier for them.”

\--

“Hey, Pretty Lady,” Chat says, popping his head through the sunroof.

Marinette can feel her whole body perk up at the sight of him. Even knowing what she wants to say to him, she feels better just seeing him. “Hey yourself.”

He plops himself onto the bed then heads down the ladder to sit near her. He grabs the extra rolling chair and slides next to her. “How was your day?”

“I don’t want to talk about that right now,” Marinette says, wrapping her arms around his neck.

He frowns. “What do you want to talk about?”

“Don’t really feel like talking,” she replies before pressing her lips against his. She never realized how addictive kissing could be until she got a partner who was willing to partake in it. And Chat Noir is a very willing partner. He pulls her closer and she falls onto his lap. They giggle for a second before taking advantage of their new position.

She manages to get lost in the kiss for a while, but they need to breathe at some point and they both know the reason he’s there; there’s no getting out of it.

“So,” Chat says after they’ve had a chance to catch their breaths.

“So,” she repeats.

“Everyone knows about us.”

“It would appear so.”

“Is that…ok?”

Marinette sighs and starts playing with the ends of his hair. “I don’t really think that matters at this point.”

“I’m sorry. I should have realized people would catch us.”

“It’s not any more your fault than it is mine. We got busted, plain and simple.”

“It’s just. You don’t seem very happy.”

“I didn’t realize how dedicated people were to stalking us. Alya, I knew, used to follow us around a lot but she chilled out eventually and I kind of thought everyone else did too? But, like, apparently a _lot_ of people sent in pictures. It started to make me think about how dedicated they might be to following us around.”

“My Lady, no one will catch us detransforming. You don’t have to worry about that.”

“That… wasn’t even what I was worried about but oh my gosh we need to seriously be careful when we transform!” Marinette removes her hands from Chat to start pulling on her own hair. “You already caught me once because I was too quick and reckless. If anyone catches us then we—”

Chat covers her mouth with his own, effectively cutting off her downward spiral of nerves. “You worry too much sometimes,” he says.

“Never cut off a lady when she’s speaking,” Marinette reprimands.

“Why? So I could hear about how we’re going to end up dying in a ditch somewhere or Hawkmoth is going to rise to power and take over the world?”

“…I was going to say we’d become brainless minions for him,” she admits reluctantly.

“Mari, I love you but sometimes your thought process scares me,” Chat laughs. “I’ve never met anyone with an imagination quite like yours.”

“I’ll take that as a compliment, thank you very much.”

“As you should,” he says, giving her an eskimo kiss. “So, what were you going to say before I put words in your mouth?”

“What if someone catches you coming in here,” she asks, her voice small.

“That’s not going to happen.”

“How do you know?”

“I’ve been coming here for ages and no one’s noticed. The first time we kiss in public and the whole world sees; I’d definitely be caught by now if it were going to happen.”

“You can’t know that, Chat. It’s dangerous. We’re playing with fire right now.”

“Marinette, what do you want me to do, stop visiting you?”

Marinette looks down and bites on her lip.

“Mari, you can’t be serious.”

“We could be risking my identity, my family, my friends.”

Chat gently grabs her face. “I would never let anything bad happen to you or your loved ones. I’ll be more careful if you want, but I’m not going to stop seeing my girlfriend.”

“We could just go on more patrols and—”

“Our whole romantic life would be under a microscope.”

“I’d rather that than have Hawkmoth go after my parents,” Marinette snaps.

“If you’d just let me show myself we wouldn’t even have to have this talk.”

“You make it sound like it’s my decision. I want to know who you are as badly as you want to tell me but, again, safety needs to be considered here.”

“We could make it work.”

“Chat, no,” Marinette says, with as much of her Ladybug authority as she can channel. It’s enough to shut him up so she must do a pretty good job.

They sit in silence, avoiding each other’s eyes for a while. Her heart is pounding frantically in her chest while she tries to think of something to say that’ll cut the tension. Her mind is running circles, though, so Chat’s the one who breaks the silence. “Okay, so no more late night visits. I’ll do it.”

“Yeah?”

“I don’t want to fight or break up over this. I just got you, I don’t want to lose you already.”

“You’re not going to lose me, Chaton. I’m yours forever. I think this is the safest option for now until we figure something out. Deal?”

“Anything for you, mon amour.”

Marinette blushes at the nickname and hides herself in his neck. She’s gotten so used to seeing Chat on a nearly nightly basis, it’s going to be weird—and difficult—not having him stop by anymore. But she knows she’s making the right decision. Two people have already accused Chat and Marinette of having some sort of affair and she can’t afford to let that list grow. 

“Since I’m already here,” Chat says, lifting her head off him with a delicate hand, “we might as well make the most of it.”

“I like the way you think,” she says before crushing her lips to his. They don’t get much talking done for the rest of the night. 

\--  
Two weeks pass and Marinette is going crazy. She still stands by her decision but she doesn’t get as much time with Chat as she used to—they tried bringing their work to a random roof one day but it left them chasing after papers and losing homework so they agreed to get all their work done before meeting up—and she misses his company. 

So, yeah, when an akuma shows up and interrupts her outing with Rose and Juleka, Marinette gets excited. She will take any time she can get with Chat. It might come at the personal expense of someone’s autonomy and half of Paris but… nope. She can’t even properly rationalize her happiness. She’s a horrible person and is completely taking advantage of her powers but she can’t bring herself to care at the moment.

“Fancy meeting you here, M’Lady,” Chat says when he drops in next to her, pressing his body infuriatingly close. 

Ladybug takes a second to peck Chat on the cheek before resuming her surveillance of the akuma. Except she has no idea where they went. Ladybug curses under her breath and shoots off in the direction she thinks they might have gone. 

They’re not usually this distracted when fighting akumas but their distance is definitely taking its toll on them both. She needs to get it together before someone gets hurt. 

“If we split up we might be able to find her faster,” Chat suggests, keeping Ladybug’s pace.

“I don’t want to split up,” Ladybug says petulantly but they both know he’s right so it’s with some trepidation that she turns left and he goes right. 

She swings through the city, looking for any sign of disruption. She doesn’t understand how a little old lady could move as quickly as she does. After nearly ten minutes of fruitless searching, she gets a call.

“Bee,” she says, just as she catches sight of someone hopping around tied in yarn. She makes a sharp turn to head in the direction that person just came from.

“Where are you? Rena’s already detransformed and Chat’s going to any minute now as well.”

“Why didn’t you call me earlier then,” Ladybug asks, exasperated. She pulls up Queen Bee’s location and rushes over, noting that the akuma is dangerously close to her house. 

“She keeps throwing sewing needles at us,” Bee says the moment Ladybug joins them on the street.

“Okay, avoid those,” Ladybug says, immediately using her yoyo as a shield.

“Obviously.”

“No need to get _wound_ up, Bee. But a lucky charm would be _off the hook_ ,” Chat says as he spins his baton as quickly as he can, taking a moment to show his dwindling pawprints. Ladybug can tell he’s losing energy but she’s glad he has enough to make bad puns. 

“Right,” Ladybug says. She stops spinning her yoyo, preparing to call on her power, when Chat yelps. “What’s wrong,” she asks, turning to face him, and startles when she sees him sprinting toward her. 

“Ladybug, look—” Chat Noir takes a needle right to his head and gets thrown back into a wall. 

“Chat,” Ladybug screams but he doesn’t respond. She is never going to get used to seeing him get hurt because of her. As if she needs to feel even more guilty, Chat’s ring beeps, reminding her that he only has about a minute left before he transforms. 

Without giving it much thought, Ladybug scoops up her boyfriend and yells a quick “I’ll be right back!” She throws him over her shoulder and swings off to her balcony. 

Ladybug crashes through her sunroof and unceremoniously tosses the unconscious Chat Noir onto her bed. She takes a deep breath, trying not to panic. All she has to do is defeat the akuma and he’ll wake up and be fine. It’ll all work out.

She hears frantic beeping and sees the beginning of a flash of green light before she clamps her eyes shut and spins around.

“Oh, my poor aching body,” a voice speaks. “I need cheese to make it better.”

“...Plagg,” Marinette asks. She’s pretty sure that’s the name of Chat’s kwami.

“Ladybug,” he responds. “You got any cheese?”

“I, uh, no I don’t think so,” she says apologetically. There’s probably cheese downstairs but she’s Ladybug right now, not Marinette, and she doesn’t have time to snoop through the kitchen.

“Chat Noir might have some in his jacket pocket for me.”

“Okay, so get it.”

“I’m too weak to move,” he says dramatically.

Ladybug purses her lips at him in annoyance. “I can’t get it without looking at him.”

“So? I need the cheese more than he needs to protect his identity.”

That makes Ladybug pause. Chat’s complained about Plagg plenty of time—he’s lazy, all he wants to do is sleep and eat cheese, he doesn’t take anything but cheese seriously—but she always assumed those were exaggerations. When it comes down it, she was sure, Plagg would put the duty of the miraculous above all else. But now he’s telling her it’s okay to look at his charge just so he can be fed.

And she is painfully tempted to do it.

“You don’t care if I know who he is?”

“Cheeeeeese,” he says.

“I thought I wasn’t supposed to know.”

“You’re not.”

“But you don’t care?”

“Look, talking like this is using up what little energy I have. Do or do not, I don’t care. But get me my cheese, however you can.”

He’s basically handing her Chat’s identity on a silver platter. Tikki isn’t there to scold her and Plagg is the devil on her shoulder, telling her to look. It would be so easy. And she knows Chat himself wouldn’t object; he’s been begging to tell her for ages now.

She turns her head in the direction she knows Chat is in and gropes around until her hand touches his shoulder. One second. That’s all she needs to know who he is. She has a strong feeling that Chat knows her as a civilian so she’s assuming she’ll recognize him.

And then they can be together for real. Nothing would hold them back. They could go on dates and cuddle in her bedroom and she could visit him for once.

She lets her hand glide across his chest, feeling his muscles through his cotton shirt, taking note of the lump where she assumes the cheese is. She finds the end of the overshirt and grips it. He’s never been more real, more tangible, than in this moment. This isn’t just Chat Noir on her bed, it’s the boy behind the mask. The boy she is madly in love with.

She lifts the light material and feels around until she locates the inner pocket.

“I have your cheese,” she says, holding the stinky wedge up.

That is enough, apparently, to get Plagg to fly over to her.

“Mmm cheese.” He grabs the cheese from her. Marinette’s empty hand goes limp and she lets it fall on Chat’s chest.

“I need to get back to the fight,” she says, standing up.

“I got it hand it to you,” Plagg says through his mouthful of cheese, “I didn’t think you’d actually resist.”

“Neither did I,” she admits.

“Marinette!” Ladybug freezes at the sound of her mother’s voice calling up to her.

“Y-yes,” she calls back, turning to face the trapdoor and opening her eyes. She has no idea what she’ll do if her mom enters and sees a passed-out boy on her bed and Ladybug standing over him.

“I didn’t realize you were home!”

“Uh, yeah,” Ladybug says, wincing. “I just got back. You must have missed me!”

“I heard voices. Do you have someone over?”

Ladybug glances at Plagg in a panic, hoping he’ll provide some help but he’s just snickering in front of her. Chat is right; least helpful kwami ever.

“I was watching a video! Sorry, I’ll turn it down.”

“Why don’t you come down here? There’s an akuma on the loose and you know your father and I would prefer if we could see you.”

“I—ah—I’m really busy right now, Maman!”

“Whatever you’re doing could surely wait a little bit.”

“Not really! It’s super important!”

“Marinette, I need help with dinner anyway. Please, come down and appease your poor parents.”

Her mom’s footsteps send Ladybug in a frenzy. She jumps down to the sitting area of her room and plops herself on the trapdoor.

“Marinette?” Her mom knocks on the door.

“Don’t come in,” Marinette calls. She should have transformed back earlier. Now it’s too late and her mom will see the light and get suspicious. This is a disaster. “I’m changing!”

“I expect you back downstairs in ten minutes,” her mother says. Ladybug sits still, straining her ears until she can no longer hear her mother’s steps.

“Oh my gosh, that was close,” Ladybug says, letting out a long breath. Her mother’s words catch up to her. “I have ten minutes to defeat the akuma and make it back!”

She shoots up and heads back to her bed to exit through her sunroof before coming to a screeching halt.

In her panic, she forgets about Chat Noir laying detransformed on her bed. In her panic, she forgets to avert her eyes.

Her brain completely shuts down as her eyes rove all over his body. She takes in his orange sneakers, his denim-clad legs, his typical black shirt with white overshirt. His hair is neater this way, well-kept and perfectly styled. His eyes are closed but she knows what they look like behind those lids; she’s spent hours upon hours memorizing his face.

Ladybug allows herself two seconds of freaking out, letting out a high-pitched whine, before she gathers herself and leaps out. She has an akuma to defeat. She can worry about the knocked-out Adrien Agreste in her bed later.

Much later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My thoughts about Alya posting their relationship on the Ladyblog: they were making out in a public place and seemed excited to tell Rena and Bee so Alya didn't even realize they wanted to keep it a secret. Also, she was excited :P
> 
> Thanks for reading! As always, find me on tumblr to fangirl with me at chelseaapproved! I was MIA there for a while but I'm back now!


	13. thirteen.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which nobody has any chill.

He’s groggy when he wakes up, confused and off-kiltered. He immediately realizes that he’s not in his room, which throws him off a bit until he recognizes the smell. It smells like cookies and floral shampoo and home. Sighing, he stuffs his face into Marinette’s pillow, content to drift back to sleep. He doesn’t know how he got here but he’s assuming it has to do with an Akuma, and his consciousness means Ladybug defeated it already.

“I’m all for a good cat nap but I’m pretty sure you’re needed at a shoot,” Plagg says. 

“Go away,” he counters, snuggling further into his girlfriend’s bed. “Wait, Plagg? What are you doing here?”

“What do you mean what am I doing here? I go everywhere you go.”

“Yeah,” he says, slowly sitting up, “but if you’re here, that means I’m—” Adrien looks down to find his two tan hands, gloveless and bare. 

He yelps and scrambles to pull the covers up, as though his whole body were naked.

“Why am I Adrien?”

“Did the Akuma do something else to you? You’re not usually this slow. You’re always Adrien.”

“Yes, no, I’m aware of who I am. But why am I in Marinette’s bed as Adrien? What happened?”

“You got knocked out by a knitting needle,” Plagg says, flat. “Real heroic. And you only had a minute before the transformation would wear off so Ladybug brought you here.”

“Oh,” he says. He can kind of remember what happened before getting hit. It’s a little embarrassing that he was so easily taken out by an old lady with yarn and needle but if that’s the worst thing that happened during the fight then he’ll take it. “Did she, um, see who I am?”

Plagg holds silent, probably to be dramatic, before finally saying, “No idea. I wasn’t paying attention.”

“What do you mean you weren’t paying attention? You were right there!”

“So were you.”

“I was knocked out.”

“And _I_ had cheese. We were both preoccupied.”

Adrien glares at his kwami for a solid 20 seconds before calling on his transformation. He’s needed at a shoot on the other side of the city and does not have time to fret about his identity.

So naturally, that’s all he does the entire shoot. 

Right now he feels there’s a solid 50/50 chance Marinette saw his identity. He hasn’t been able to check his phone to see if she tried contacting him but even if there’s nothing there, that’s no indication of whether she knows or not. He needed quite some time to digest her reveal and he’s assuming it’ll take just as long for her, if not even longer. 

He knows he was Adrien when he woke up but she might have dumped him and ran, meaning she wouldn’t have seen. The fact that he was in her room instead of his own definitely supports that theory. In fact, the more he thinks about it, the more it makes sense that she _doesn’t_ know who he is. The only thing keeping him from writing the whole thing off is this nagging feeling in the back of his head. 

By the time he’s finished, Adrien has a pounding headache and exactly 0 messages from his girlfriend. Tomorrow, at least, he’ll get his answers. 

\--

Or not.

He gets to school early; on the off chance Marinette actually makes it to school before the bell, he’s hoping they could talk. 

He spends the next twenty minutes coming up with different conversation starters and reasons why he’s standing in front of her locker but he doesn’t come up with anything good. If she knows about him, he doesn’t need to do much but if she doesn’t then he needs a better excuse than, “you have a pretty cool locker.”

It winds up being all for moot when the warning bell rings with no sign of Mari. Disappointed, he reluctantly makes his way to class. Only to see Marinette sitting at her desk already. The moment their eyes meet, Marinette blushes and starts whispering to Alya.

That’s...certainly a reaction. But he can’t really say whether it’s because she knows or not because Marinette always acts weird around him. 

He slips into his seat, once again too aware of her presence behind him. He doesn’t have a chance to talk to her before class starts so he’s left wondering.

Wondering whether she knows. If she purposefully avoided her locker so he wouldn’t be able to catch her before school—because obviously Marinette would be able to predict his moves if she knows who he is. 

He wonders whether her reaction to seeing him was due to knowing he’s Chat Noir. Things with Marinette haven’t been easy since she rejected him but she hasn’t straight up avoided him like that in years. 

Mostly, he wonders if he’s just overreacting.

“Adrien.”

Adrien startles in his seat and looks up to see the teacher staring down at him expectantly.

“Um, can you repeat the question,” he asks timidly. He can hear the giggles and whispers behind him as he gets reprimanded for not paying attention; Adrien Agreste always knows the answer and is always prepared.

After class isn’t any better. Alya grabs onto him before he can leave the room. “We were talking about eating lunch at the park today,” she says. “You in?”

Adrien glances at Marinette—who is staring at her shoes—before nodding to Alya. “Absolutely. I’ll meet you guys there.” 

Even if he can’t speak to her one-on-one, he’ll have a better idea after spending some time with her. 

He doesn’t have any other morning classes with her so he’s stuck with only his thoughts to entertain himself until lunch. Adrien takes longer at his locker than necessary, trying to psyche himself up for what will undoubtedly be an uneventful lunch but just the thought of having to see her again makes him anxious. Eventually deciding he’s just being dumb, Adrien takes a steadying breath and heads over. 

Marinette, Nino, and Alya are all there by the time he makes it to the park. Adrien plops himself next to Nino. 

“Hey! We didn’t think you were gonna make it,” Nino says, clapping Adrien on the back. 

“Sorry, I got held up. What’d I miss?”

“Nino and I were actually talking about helping Rose with her… thing,” Alya interjects, nudging Marinette. “So, yeah. We were just waiting for you so Marinette wouldn’t be alone but now you’re here to keep her company.”

“Alya,” Marinette warns. But Alya is a woman on a mission. She rises, stares at Nino before he gets up as well and they make their way back to the school.

Clearly Marinette still hasn’t told her about their kiss or her secret relationship. 

Adrien clears his throat and tries to come up with something to say. Even though there isn’t anyone at their table, there are still a lot of people milling about. They’re not private enough to properly talk.

“You have hair,” Marinette finally says. 

Adrien looks up to see her beautiful, blushing face and feels his own face heating up. “Uh, yeah,” he says, scratching the back of his neck. What did _that_ mean? Why does she have to be so awkward? 

“It-it’s nice?”

“My hair?”

“Yeah. It’s good hair.”

“Thanks. You too. Have good hair.” He cringes. She’s somehow managed to infect him with improper grammar and stilted conversation. 

“Thank you.”

They fall back into silence and Adrien wants to pull his ‘good’ hair out. He still, somehow, has no idea if she knows and it’s driving him crazy. He almost wants to reveal himself then and there just to figure it out. Not for the first time, Adrien finds himself praying for an akuma so he can properly talk to Ladybug.

Instead, he quietly mentions the time and the two trek back to the school without another word.

\--

Marinette bumps into him at the end of the day.

“Oh! Adrien, I was looking for you.”

His heart picks up. There’s too many people around for this to be a confession but he can’t help but dream a bit. Why else would she be looking for him, after all?

“What’s up?”

“I—I didn’t understand the physics today. Would you be able to help me out?”

His face falls for a second before he plasters a polite smile back on. “Sure. I have fencing in about an hour so I was going to wait in the library. Would you like to join me?”

“I—I mean, I can but I was th-thinking we could go back to my house? We can have snacks and hang out in my room?”

“I don’t really have a lot of time. It’d be easier to do it here. I can always come over another day though.”

“No, it’s fine,” she pouts. “Let’s just go to the library.”

It’s not until they’re 30 minutes into physics review and Marinette gets yet another question correct that Adrien realizes he might be a bit daft. He could be looking for clues that aren’t there but Marinette doesn’t actually seem to be confused about today’s lesson. She might have only asked to get him alone. And he had to ruin it by taking her to a library filled with other students. 

Adrien slams his head against the table and lets out a low moan.

“Are-are you okay?”

“I’m so dumb,” he whines.

He feels a slender hand grab his and he looks up to see Marinette smiling softly at him. He unconsciously leans closer.

“You’re one of the smartest people I know,” she says.

“I don’t really feel that way,” he says, slouching back onto the table. 

“You are a tad dense,” she admits.

Adrien huffs out a laugh before sitting up straight. “Are we talking about the same thing?”

“I’m not sure? What are you talking about?”

Adrien stares at her for longer than is polite, hoping that her face will reveal what he is _dying_ to know. “I’m sorry I made you come to the library,” he finally says. “I should have gone to your house.”

“It’s alright,” she says, patting his shoulder, “there’ll be plenty of time for that.”

\--

Adrien is sorely tempted to visit Marinette as Chat but he knows she’ll get mad at him, especially if his hunch is wrong and she doesn’t know. He settles for taking taking a long shower to relax his nerves.

When he’s done, he puts on a pair of boxers, using his towel to ring out his hair. 

“Aren’t you going to put on pants,” Plagg asks.

“I’m getting to it,” Adrien says. He absentmindedly checks his phone and is disappointed when he sees Marinette hasn’t texted him. 

“You should probably get to it sooner.”

Adrien looks up from his phone to glare at his nagging kwami before letting out a very unmanly shriek. Ladybug is at his window. 

He slowly makes his way over to her, opening the latch with shaky hands.

“S-sorry,” she says, blushing furiously. “I should have called before coming or something.” She’s looking anywhere but at him and he realizes that he’s still only wearing boxers. 

“Oh, I, yeah. I’ll just, um, put clothes on. Hold on.” Adrien all but runs into his closet and grabs the first thing he sees. 

He returns to see Ladybug sitting tensely on his couch. He sits as far away from her as possible on the couch and faces forward. 

“So… Come here often,” he asks.

“You—” Ladybug lets out a long breath. “You’re the most ridiculous person I’ve ever met.”

Adrien grins and turns to face her. “I can’t seem to help myself when I’m with you.”

“I’m really embarrassed,” Ladybug says. 

“Why?” If anything, Adrien should be the embarrassed one. For so many reasons.

“All the things I said about you as Adrien and Chat,” Marinette says. Adrien feels any remaining tension leave him. “And then I rejected you so I could date you, oh my gosh, I can’t even imagine what you must think of me.”

“I think you’re amazing. Honestly, it’s really flattering that you liked me twice.”

“Ugh,” Ladybug says, hiding her face in her hands. 

“Are you upset that I’m me?”

“What kind of stupid question is that?” she asks, looking up to glare at him.

“You’ve been acting weird all day and now I’m making you uncomfortable.”

“I said I’m _embarrassed_ not uncomfortable. This is better than I could have ever hoped for.”

Adrien’s heart flips in his chest and he slides closer to her, unable to stop himself. “I could say the same thing.”

Ladybug blushes and closes the distance between them, allowing their shoulders to brush. Adrien pulls his arm out so he can wrap it around her, revelling in the way she automatically leans into him.

“I used to have pictures of you all over my wall,” Ladybug says.

“Wait, what?”

“I told you that I liked Adrien Agreste. What I didn’t tell you was that I was borderline obsessed and took full advantage of the fact that my crush was a model.”

“I never saw them,” he says, his heart pounding for some unknown reason.

“That’s because I took them down whenever I knew Adrien was coming over and permanently took them down so I could invite Chat Noir in.”

“Oh,” is all Adrien can think to say. Then, “so, can I kiss you now, or…?”

Ladybug moans before sliding away from him. “You can’t do that.”

“Do what?” 

“With your face.”

“What’s wrong with my face,” he asks, bringing a hand self-consciously to wipe anything offensive off his face.

“Nothing. That’s the problem.”

“Mari,” Adrien whines. He shifts a bit so he can lay comfortably on the couch with his head in her lap. She might have rejected his kiss but he’s still sure they’re good. Her hands absentmindedly running through his hair is enough of a confirmation of this. “Stop confusing me.”

“I’m not used to Adrien saying things like that. And knowing you’re Chat makes it so much worse. But I’m also still trying to wrap my head around the fact that I’ve been dating Adrien Agreste this entire time? And, like, I _want_ to kiss you but every time I let my thoughts wander too far I start to feel guilty. Like I’m cheating on Chat or something which is ridiculous because _you’re_ Chat.”

“It took me a while to really let it sink in, too. We can slow things down until you’re ready.” 

“You’re sweet but I used to have fantasies of making out with you in your room while I’m transformed and I really want to do that.”

Adrien abruptly sits up. “Oh my gosh, yes please. I’ve wanted that since I met you. Yes. Let’s do that now.”

Ladybug laughs before grabbing his shirt and pulling him into her. A chill runs down his spine when she wraps her gloved hands around his neck, sinking even further into each other. Fourteen year-old Adrien probably would have had an aneurysm by now. Present Adrien, though, can’t help but yearn for more skin-to-skin contact.

“M’lady,” Adrien asks, his mouth still feathering her lips, “would you be able to—”

She doesn’t even let him finish his question before she releases her transformation, leaving just Marinette and Adrien to stare at each other. Her bare hands slip under his shirt and she lets them travel up and down his back.

“I love you, Marinette Ladybug Dupain-Cheng,” Adrien whispers before tucking himself into her neck and gently pressing a kiss beneath her ear.

“You’re such a dork,” Marinette giggles. Her hands stop on his lower back and she nuzzles even closer to him. “I love you, too, Adrien Chat Noir Agreste.”

“Alright, I think I’ve kept quiet long enough,” Plagg says, flying over to them. “Can I have my cheese now?”

“Plagg! Really?” 

He can hear Marinette’s laughter while he fetches the cheese from his mini-fridge and his heart lifts. There’s no more secrets between them—no more masks—and when he turns back around to the smiling faces of Tikki, Plagg, and Marinette, he feels himself grin back, finally home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adrien: If I can't visit you as Chat Noir why can you come here as Ladybug?  
> Marinette: ...desperate times call for desperate measures.
> 
> ANYWAY. Next (and last!!!) chapter is more like an epilogue and it is borderline crack but it makes me laugh so *shrugs*
> 
> Thanks for reading! As always, find me at chelseaapproved.tumblr.com!


	14. epilogue.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A few months later...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a joke of an ending but it's basically the scene that inspired this entire story so I couldn't NOT include it. Also, friendly reminder that I started this story before S2 came out and this chapter is the least S2 compliant of them all.
> 
> Thank you all so much for following along the most self-indulgent story I have ever written. Your support has meant everything.

A new hero makes his appearance several months after Marinette and Adrien become official. Marinette thought Queen Bee was going to be the last hero of their group but when a hero who goes by Carapace comes swinging by, she realizes she’s wrong.

She wonders how many more Master Fu is going to send and what it means now that someone else has Wayzz. There’s not really any time to worry about that with the Akuma on the loose, so she pushes it out of her mind until they can have an official team meeting.

Once the threat is gone, they all agree to recharge and meet on top of a building she and Chat like to go to when they want to be alone.

Chat Noir catches Ladybug’s eye and she nods in understanding. When the gang splits, the pair head straight to the roof. The moment Ladybug lands, Chat’s on her, pressing her up against the brick wall that she assume leads to the stairway. 

Ladybug knows she’s going to transform any second, she can vaguely hear her earrings beeping, but she doesn’t really care when Chat is kissing her _just there_ and it turns her brain to mush. When she transforms back into Marinette, Tikki goes straight for the bag full of cookies, so Marinette’s not really that concerned. She knows she’ll have time to transform back before anyone gets there.

What she’s not expecting is for anyone else to be early. 

“What the hell is going on here?” comes the screeching voice of Queen Bee. 

Chat and Marinette break away and stare at each other in shock. It takes a few seconds for Chat to realize who, exactly, he’s caught with and he moves in front of her to try to block her from view but it’s far too late. 

“I _knew_ there was something going on between the two of you,” Rena Rouge says. “I can’t believe you would cheat on Ladybug. She’s supposed to be your soulmate! What kind of hero two-times his super-awesome, super-kickass girlfriend?”

Marinette clenches her fist, ready to defend him but he grabs her fist and makes her relax.

“It’s not what it looks like,” Chat says weakly. 

“It looks like you were seconds away from ripping her clothes off,” Bee says.

“Th-that’s not—”

“I thought you were better than this,” Rena says. 

Her accusatory tone is too much for Marinette to handle. Before Marinette can control herself, before she even knows what she’s doing, she steps forwards and blurts out, “I’m Ladybug.”

The roof goes quiet, the only noise comes from the traffic below. And then— “ _what_ ” the two girls exclaim at the same time.

“Are you kidding me?!”

“There’s no way _you_ can possibly be Ladybug, you’re so...so… ugh.”

Marinette doesn’t really know what Bee means by that but she opens up her bag and pulls out a glaring Tikki.

“Sorry, Tikki,” Marinette says, wincing. “It just slipped out.”

“That’s not the kind of thing that should ever ‘just slip out.’” But there’s nothing they can do about it now so Tikki, ever the good sport, flies over to Rena Rouge and Queen Bee. “Hi, I’m Tikki, Marinette’s kwami.”

“Oh, hell no,” Rena says. “How could I have missed this?”

“Wait, this baffling discovery aside,” Bee says, “what about Adrien?”

“I—” Marinette tries, but she doesn’t have anything to say. She’s a little concerned about how Queen Bee knows her well enough to know she’s dating Adrien but that’s not really what’s important right now. 

“Marinette Dupain-Cheng,” Bee says, in a voice that sounds so painfully familiar, “do you mean to tell me you’re two-timing Adrien Agreste and Chat Noir? You think just because you’re Ladybug you can get away with whatever you want?”

“Leave her alone,” Chat says, stepping forward and wrapping an arm around Marinette. “She’s not cheating on anyone. Obviously I’m Adrien.” As if he needed to prove himself, Chat releases his transformation. 

Plagg takes one second to look around before claiming, “I’m not dealing with this right now,” and flies off into Adrien’s shirt.

“Adrien!” Tikki exclaims. “Not you too!”

Adrien just shrugs, that stupid, sexy smirk on his face. “I wasn’t gonna let my lady face it alone. We’ve dealt with that plenty already.”

“So you mean to tell me,” Queen Bee says, her voice low and dangerous, “that I’ve had to listen to the same idiot boy pine over the same stupid girl a million times only to find out they’re the same person?”

“What… Chloé?” Adrien asks incredulously.

Queen Bee huffs before releasing her transformation, revealing Chloé Bourgeois and a yellow bee kwami.

“You are officially the stupidest boy I ever met,” Chloé says, folding her arms and pouting. 

“No. Noooo no no no no. There is no freaking way this is my life. Two of my best friends have been Ladybug and Chat Noir all along and I used to make out with Chloé.”

“You should be honored that I wanted to make out with you,” Chloé says, tossing her hair over her shoulder. “Everyone wants to at least once.”

“You guys have been making out,” Marinette asks. How in the world had she missed that?

“We used to before I got a girlfriend,” Chloé says.

“It was just a way to pass the time while I waited for Nino to get his head out of his ass,” Rena Rouge shrugs.

 _”Alya?!”_ Marinette exclaims in disbelief.

“Oops.”

“This day isn’t happening,” Adrien mutters under his breath while he tugs on his hair. “I’m going to wake up and this whole thing will have been a strange dream.”

Alya releases her transformation as well, leaving four well-acquainted teenagers staring at each other on a roof. 

Marinette knows, in theory, that she should say something. She’s kind of the leader of the group and only had two earth-shattering reveals, which is two less than Alya and Chloé. But her brain is just static.

“So…” is all she manages to squeak out. 

Naturally, that’s when Carapace decides to show up. He jumps down, all smiles and excitement. “Hey dudes!”

Then, he pauses, looks around and no doubt processes the fact that he looking at four very average civilians and four flying kwamis. 

“Oh shit,” he exclaims. “No way. This explains so much, oh my god. Oh man, okay. I can handle this.”

And then _he’s_ detransforming right in front of them. 

Marinette shouts a weak, “wait!” but it’s too late—there’s a flash of light and then Nino is grinning at them.

“Dudes! I can’t believe we’re all in the same class! This is sick!”

Marinette looks at Adrien who just shrugs at her before putting his arm around her. “Welcome to the club?” she says. This is going to be an interesting night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ahhhh it's finally finished!!!! Can I tell you all a secret? I've never finished a multi-chapter fic before and I give most of the credit to all you amazing people who kept me motivated to keep going. It took way longer than I expected but if it weren't for you guys I would have just jumped ship when life got too hard to keep writing. So seriously, THANK YOU.
> 
> I'm planning on writing 3 more half-reveal stories so let me know who you want to find out next (Marinette, Adrien, or Ladybug). They're probably only going to be one-shots but hopefully still fun!
> 
> You are all the best!


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